Before Prince Qui had been out of the walls, he had been briefed multiple times on what he was supposed to do. His father talked to him about it, solemnly. He had been repeatedly told that he was not allowed to claim praise for what he was about to do.
"I don't care," was what he said. He only had one goal in his mind. He had to take the people from outside the walls into their empire to be able to help and protect them.
Every time his father reminded him of it, this had been his only response: "It doesn't matter."
He knew that he had to have a bad reputation for a cause. He rode along with that idea and he was not going to alight from it. It was working. No point in changing an idea that was yielding good results. Even if it meant that he was eternally destroyed in the people's eyes.