CHAPTER TWENTY ONE
With that, Eden finally lost her tiny amount of patience. She lunged at the emperor with her sword, which was easily blocked and flung off to the side. In a few moments, there was a familiar piece of metal at her neck. Eden frowned. It wasn't supposed to end so soon. She wouldn't let it.
"Dear, you should have gotten rid of me first. Poison would have done it." The emperor sighed and then started rambling about different types of poisons. What the heck? Eden's hand silently fumbled down to her shoes, hastily undoing shoe buckles. Once the high heel was safe in her palm, she smiled. "Father, instead of poison, I think this will do the trick as well." And with that, the emperor was smacked in the head with a high heel. His head snapped back with a mortifying crack, and Eden tried not to gag. Another high heel and the emperor staggered back as he clutched his nose, which had been broken mercilessly with the fashion accessory. Eden scrambled to grab her sword, and, in one fluid motion, picked it up to plunge it through the emperor's neck. Blood splattered the soft velvet of the throne as Eden smiled in victory. Wiping the ratface's blood off of her precious throne, she sat down and crossed her legs, taking up a graceful position, one hand still on the hilt of her sword. As guards rushed in, they took in the scene. This was an empire built on hereditary succession, after all, and those successes did not always end peacefully. Eden wasn't the first person who had been killed to get her spot. Instantly, the guards all sank to one knee.
"All hail the new empress of the Ruthim Empire."