The Imperial Capital of Great Yin, the Hall of Heaven's Mandate.
Ye Tang sat alone on the dragon throne. The hall was empty, without even a servant in attendance.
It was not that he wanted no one to attend him. He had driven them all out.
He did not want anyone to see the expression on his face at that moment.
Three southern cities had fallen, Zhongyang Pass was in peril, refugees flooded into the Imperial Capital like a rising tide, the granaries were running dry, and fear had begun to spread.
Every one of these was an omen of a nation's fall.
And he could do nothing.
"Your Majesty."
The chief eunuch's trembling voice came from outside the hall. "Tonight's evening meal..."
"Cancel it."
Weariness tinged Ye Tang's voice. "I have no appetite."
The chief eunuch acknowledged the order, and his footsteps gradually faded away.
Ye Tang leaned back on the dragon throne and closed his eyes.
He thought of his father.
That man he had never truly understood.
Ye Jing, Great Yin's third prince, a victim of the Mirage Dragon Rebellion-and one of its instigators.
In everyone's memory, his father was a madman, a vessel for an evil entity, a sinner who had nearly destroyed Great Yin.
Ye Tang knew little of what had actually happened. Even his father's face had grown hazy in his memory. He had never seen that man again after the age of six.
He had spent many years in a remote, desolate town far from the Imperial Capital, not even knowing his own identity.
Many years later, the Mirage Dragon Rebellion erupted, Ye Jing perished, and the direct line of the Ye clan was all but wiped out.
Yet he, an illegitimate son, had survived.
After Eldest Princess Ye Fu quelled the chaos,