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This emperor was paranoid about his safety because every night an unknown assassin would attack and kill his personal guard, leaving him alone alive. Every night new soldiers would be assigned. Few generals knew the truth and those that knew were afraid to act, for the assassin was the emperor himself who would awake in the middle of the night and kill the bodyguards. I think that otherwise the emperor acted as a sane and responsible ruler, but that might be just my flawed memory.
This wasn't the main plot of the book I was reading but was used to illustrate a point. I don't know if the main book is non-fiction or science fiction, but I'm more interested in this story than the book it appears in.