Ye Chuqi laughed. "It's an honor to be received by Your Majesty."
The Little Emperor walked over with steady steps despite his tiny stature and sat down at his leisure. "I've heard of you." Milforth had told him what happened before leaving Rewa Island. The Little Emperor glanced at the Thousand-Leaf Sword at Ye Chuqi's waist. "I've also heard you intend to take the Thousand-Leaf Sword to the Land of Inheritance yourself?"
Ye Chuqi ran a finger lightly along the blade of the Thousand-Leaf Sword and nodded.
"Do you know how dangerous that place is? How many people die there every year?"
Ye Chuqi did not.
The Little Emperor's father, the previous emperor, had died there. When Her Majesty the Empress received the news, the shock sent her into a difficult labor. She gave birth to him but eventually died of grief. That was why he had inherited the throne as an infant.
Before him, his grandfather and several other emperors had died there as well. It was like a silent sacrifice: knowing they would never return, they had still gone willingly to their deaths in search of an answer.
The Little Emperor was young, but he had already shouldered far too many responsibilities for his age and learned far too many truths.
The Barton Empire should have left this place and sought a new land when it learned the Magic Formation was about to fail. Yet none of the emperors could bear to abandon the legacy built over thousands of years, or give up the Land of Inheritance.
Because it held the Barton Empire's foundations, its origins, its everything?
The Little Emperor glanced at Milforth, who stood to one side with his hands at his sides. Milforth had once been his mother's steward. After her death, Milforth had raised