Aerilan Flameblood, the prophesied Dragonsinger who recently freed the people of Paxia from the cruel tyranny of Bythregur the Shadow-Stealer, expressed disappointment recently at not being made king of the country he recently freed from terror and servitude.

"I guess it was a little naive on my part," the slender but firm-bodied young man reported in an interview yesterday. "I mean, here I braved the Caverns of the Shrieking Souls, claimed the Star Gem from the Blind Eagle of Godsdagger Mountain, and ended the curse of Shezrac Shistenar, Ice Witch of the Seven Islands. I really thought that I'd established my credentials as an executive decision-maker."

According to a chained virgin who was nearby at the time, Flameblood slew the Shadow-Stealer at the top of a ziggurat the Shadow-Stealer had created in order to enact some ambiguous but horrific ritual and harness the power of the Elder Gods. "It was tough to see, since I was chained to this giant serpent statue," reported the virgin, who asked that her name not be revealed, "but I guess Aerilan and Bythregur were fighting with swords, and Bythregur, who had, you know, a lot more upper-body strength, was winning. And then Aerilan did something with some gem or song or flower or something along those lines, you know, poetic and all, and Bythregur screamed and turned into a pile of dust. Which, honestly, makes you wonder why Aerilan didn't just do the gem/song/flower thing right off the bat and then unchain me from the damn statue that much sooner."

The erstwhile sacrifice continued on and reported that upon defeating the Shadow-Stealer, Flameblood looked down at the assembled crowd around the ziggurat and proclaimed, "You are free, my people!" in an enormous shout. When people in the crowd began to ask who would be their king now, since the Shadow-Stealer had consumed the flesh of the former royal family, Flameblood's name was apparently put forward as a candidate. The lithe hero, however, declined, calling out that the people should "rule together as a united people, that the voice of each man be heard equally." At the time, this implied reference to representative democracy was greeted with approval and strong support, but Flameblood maintains that it was not entirely what he had in mind.

"I really didn't want to seem too eager, you know?" he said, moving through the ninety-seven movements of the Dragon-Blade Dance taught to him by a mysterious old man in the mountains. "I figured I'd call out that they should rule each other, and then they'd elect me to kind of man the helm, as it were. If I'd known that they were going to just nod and start talking about parliamentary procedure, I would never have brought it up in the first place. I mean, do you really want peasants, none of whom were mentioned as the Singer of Dragons in the prophecies of the Mad Seer Esliminax, to be making decisions about national security or deciding what the next ten years of economic development are going to look like?"

Flameblood added that he would have no objections to the formation of a constitutional monarchy, giving him veto power over parliamentary legislature and a limited ability to make unilateral decisions in times when "the Book of Ages turns to another page". Newly elected representatives from the People's Democratic and Free Republic of Paxia declined to comment on the suggestion.