Twenty years ago.
"Return and I will have you hunted like a stray dog." The Emperor, recently crowned, has his expression shaded by shadow. His clothes are nondescript and he looks more like a vagabond than an emperor.
No one knows his whereabouts aside from his most loyal retainer, who have followed him to a rundown countryside residence with a weed-filled yard and untended gardens.
The pitter-patter of rain assaults the leaking roof ceaselessly, lightning thunders across black skies.
A bitter laugh echoes in a lonely, empty room. The man who sits in a corner has clothes soaked, body wounded, dressed in black. He does not seem to care about anything though, in fact it's as though pain does not bother him at all.
"You speak as if I want to return to this place, Your Majesty." He looks up from his hunched position on the cold damp ground. And though he's no different than a beaten mutt, the sharpness in his eyes does not disappear so easily.
