"You and dear Azah seem to have great faith in me, I will no my best to not let you down." tradition meant very little to Xiu, but they meant a great deal to her father which probably explained why he placed her in the position of Minister for Culture. Their family was relatively new to the throne, Xiu's grandparents, her grandfather a member of the Dai Li and her grandmother the Grand Secretariat, had seized power from the disliked, ailing and heir-less Earth King. It marked the beginning of a new dynasty and, as they had ruled jointly, the first female ruler of the Earth Kingdom. Xiu imagined that her father clung to tradition to simply annoy his parents and after their deaths had grown too used to it.
She found her eyes moving to the ground before them when he spoke of proving her ability to her father. "Kozu, I trust you not to spread this around or to make out of it something it isn't, but I know my father has no faith in me. He began to hate my grandmother after his father died because she continued to rule and not step down as he would have wished because she was a woman. I fear he is pushing me to marry because he cannot bear the thought of an Earth Queen on the throne alone, and that he grants me these ranks only to placate me. I know he loves me as a father should, but he does not like the idea of me ruling."