It's laborious having to ring an emperor before us
I believe the answer is:
onerous
'it's laborious' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'to ring an emperor before us' is the wordplay.
'to ring' becomes 'o' (letter resembling a ring).
'an emperor' becomes 'nero' (Roman emperor).
'before' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other).
'o'+'nero'+'us'='ONEROUS'
'having' acts as a link.
(Other definitions for onerous that I've seen before include "'Heavy, burdensome (7)'" , "Trying" , "Burdensome, oppressive" , "Burdensome, demanding" , "Toilsome" .)