Rex was taken by surprise he didn't expect to see anyone welcome him he nodded "Thank you it's nice to meet all of you".
He then turned around and looked at the general "Sir what's going on?"
James smiled "They are going to take care of the duties of the house, you don't expect to be able to clean something of this size by yourselves are you?"
He nodded "I understand General." He turned around again and gave a small bow "I'll be in your care from on".
James then looked at the butler and signaled him to walk forward "This is John, it's his first time being a butler but he was trained by my own."
Rex gave him another bow "It's a pleasure John I look forward to working together".
The young butler shook his head "No master the General has already told me of your victories at such a young age. The pleasure of working with you is all mine, I might be a bit inexperienced but I promise you that I will do everything the best I can."
Rex nodded "I would like for you to get all the workers together so that I can meet them one by one once the general leaves."
The butler bowed "As you wish master" and he left along with the maids.
James smiled "There's another thing that I want to show you."
He led the way through the mansion until they were outside. After walking they arrived at an exit where there was a flat courtyard with sand that was about the size of 6 basketball courts. From here he could get a feeling of what shape the mansion took, It was a square shape with the huge courtyard in the middle.
That wasn't what surprised him the most, what did was that about 400 demi-humans of all races were chained and gathered at the courtyard. He quickly turned to the general "What's the meaning of this he asked."
James pointed at them "Well you're my student, I don't have much to teach you about battling. The only thing that you lack is experience and tactics, once that is done you can start being a commander and then get war merits to become a general. To accomplish that you will need your own military."
Rex looked at them again, most were in a sorry state, he could see that there were children and women in the mix. He turned back to the general "These are the slaves that you bought from Simon".
James nodded "Yes they are, from now on they are your soldiers everything will be left to you. You get to decide how they train, eat, and even sleep this way you can get used to the pressure of having to order others around. I know that you think that you are a simple commoner, that's the reason that you didn't ask for rewards but you got to get rid of that way of thinking."
He looked at James and sighed "If you just knew how wrong you are, the reason that I didn't ask for anything was simply to gain your trust" he thought.
"Aren't you afraid that after they are trained they will revolt", he asked the general.
James shrugged "that's your problem, knowing you that isn't likely to happen."
Rex looked at him "You really like to teach by first-hand experience don't you."
The general laughed and began leaving "Well my job here is done, I'll leave you here to organize everything. Later today the rest of your friends will be brought here. I'll give you a week to get everything up and running after that report to my house and the lessons will begin. Oh almost forgot there is a library with some of the basics of military knowledge if you have time get started reading them."
After turning back to give him a thumbs up the general left and he was alone being stared at by around 400 people. He looked at them and found that there were 10 guards next to them keeping them in check.
He looked at them and said, "Guards come over here."
They hesitated at first but then they nodded and walked towards him. When they were about 4 feet away from him they kneeled "Sir how may we serve you."
Rex looked at them uncomfortably "Are all of you guards of the mansion."
All 10 of them nodded. "How many of you are able to write and count?" he asked.
Only 3 of them were able to raise their hands. The rest looked at him a bit depressed, "Don't worry if you don't, luckily that's something that can be taught."
He pointed at Sarah and Anna "The seven of you split up and group with one of them, I need each team to guard the 2 doors so that no one can get out of here. The three that can read come with me one of you go and ask John to see if he can get you 3 pieces of paper and a pen.
They quickly did as they were told and after the guard came back with the paper he handed it to the three of them. Then he looked at the slaves and yelled out "I want women at this corner, children at that end and men on that other one."
The slaves looked at him, most of the women and children did as they were told. Very little of the men followed the directions he sighed and looked at Anna's group since she was the one that had an extra soldier. "One of you go and let John know that I won't be able to meet all of you until tomorrow".
One of the guards quickly bowed "Right away Sir" and ran off.
He looked back at the stubborn slaves "May I know why you're not following directions? Is it because you don't know what gender or age you are?"
The slaves looked at him with even more anger "We won't follow the commands of a weak human child that thinks of us as playthings."
Rex looked at the one who had spoken and found a man in his early 30s who was a tiger demi-human "Who said that I think about you that way, better yet what makes you think that I'm weak".
The slaves started laughing "As I thought you are an arrogant human" yelled out the same demi-human.
Rex sighed and shook his head "Does that mean that if I can beat you then you'll do as I say?"
The man looked at him with a sly smile "Maybe."
He looked at the man who thought that he was smart enough to trick him "Let me rephrase my question, does that mean that I have to beat every single one of you to be able to give you orders."
All the slaves that hadn't moved nodded. Rex sighed "Yeah that's what I thought." He looked around and found all the guards worried. He looked back at the demi-humans "Do you guys think you can give me 10 minutes to get ready? After that, we can start fighting."
The demi-humans laughed "Take all the time you like" replied the man.
When he headed back to the door one of the guards looked at him "Sir don't tell me that you are actually thinking of fighting with these beasts." The guard had clearly forgotten that he was told to follow Anna who was also demi-human.
Rex looked at him "Look they are not beasts, just like us they are people and they have feelings, I don't want to ever hear that word come out of your mouths again. You are willing to follow me because of your loyalty to your country but tell me if they are treated worse than trash in this country. Can you give me a reason why they should follow my orders?"
The guard stayed quiet. "That's right there is none, that's why I have to prove to them that I'm at least worthy for them to follow my instructions."
All the guards that were in Anna's group kneeled to him "Forgive us for our ignorance."
Rex shook his head "It's not your fault that's just the environment that you were raised in but don't let it happen again".
He then walked into the house and headed to a quiet room.