Attorio Maldive III

Attorio Maldive III
King of Astrolinium
King Attorio Maldive III
Reign	14 October 2010 – present (6 years)
Full name	Ilia Franchisco Attore
Born	(1995-01-03)January 3, 1995
Birthplace	Astrolinium
Predecessor	Attorio Maldive II
Royal House	Astor
Father	Attorio Maldive II
Mother	Miriam Attore
Religious beliefs	Irreligious
Signature

Attorio Maldive III (born Ilia Franchisco Attore, 3 January 1995) has been King of Astrolinium since 14 October 2010. His full title in English is "Lord and Emperor of the Sublime Kingdom of Astrolinium, Mayor of the Town of Astrolinium, Sole Legislator and Juror for the Sublime Island Kingdom, First Among Equals, Lord President of Ankh Mauta, and Delegate to the World Assembly for Ankh Mauta". He was born in Astrolinium as the only child of King Attorio Maldive II and the Queen, Lady Miriam Attore. After spending a childhood being educated by the best tutors, he ascended to the throne in October of 2010 after his father lost a long battle with lung cancer.

He has made frequent state visits to the neighboring nations of Malsitar and Eugepae, and has gained a reputation for being charismatic and brazen, including a notable incident in which he and a Roman noble absconded from a palace and posed as commoners for a day during a state visit there. In addition to being the youngest monarch in Astrolinium's history, he is also notable for being its first openly homosexual ruler.

Name

Attorio's full, legal name is Attorio Ilia Franchisco Maldive. He is, however, to be referred to as Attorio Maldive III in official contexts, though he tends to go by his birth name, Ilia Franchisco Attore, in private life. Additionally, for contexts which involve the use of Latin, he is officially to be referred to as Astorius Maldivis III, though he often uses Franciscus Aelius Astor, his original nomen Latinum, in private life.

Early life

Ilia Franchisco Attore was born on the morning of 3 January 1995 at Asclepius Medical Center on the island of Astrolinium. His mother, Lady Miriam, is the daughter of Mose Levi, and his father, Attorio Maldive II, born Giulio Attore, was the fourth King of Astrolinium. He was raised in Astrolinium, though the family often summered on land they owned in neighboring Eugepae and Malsitar, where Ilia would often play with cousins whose parents had emigrated to those nations. Though he spent his formative years enrolled in the Astrolinium school, his education was supplemented by tutors brought in from other countries, who assisted the young prince in learning etiquette, strategy, diplomacy, and languages.

Citing his position as crown prince and the air of understanding and acceptance his family had promoted, Ilia publicly came out as homosexual in April of 2009 during an interview with the international magazine Royalty Today. Though there was some backlash from more traditional elements of Astrolinian society, public reception of this revelation was largely positive, and the crown prince quickly became a role model for LGBT youth. His early teenage years were tainted, however, by the news that his father, Attorio Maldive II, had been diagnosed with lung cancer. In spite of receiving excellent medical care, Ilia lost his father in October of 2010, when he himself was only fifteen. Despite his youth, he accompanied his mother at the position of honor in the funeral procession.

Reign

Coronation and Regency of Lady Miriam

On 14 October 2010, a mere five days after his father's death, Ilia Attore was crowned in the Ceremonial Meadow. He was crowned by Perre Donatello, his father's Secretary of Domestic Affairs, and assumed the nom d'roi of Attorio Maldive III, honoring his father and grandfather in doing so. His first act as King was to declare a week of mourning for his late father. Following this degree, he temporarily relinquished power and instituted his mother, Lady Miriam, as Lady Regent of the Sublime Island Kingdom "until such a time as [he] would be mature enough to resume the throne".

Lady Miriam served as regent until 5 March 2011, two months after Attorio's sixteenth birthday, which has traditionally been considered the age of majority in Astrolinium. During her regency, she took steps to construct a fitting memorial for her late husband in the cemetery at King's Church, the island's Catholic church. She also instituted the public lighting of a Hanukkah menorah in the town's Market Square during December of 2010.

Pre-Earthquake (2010-2011)

Throughout his mother's regency, Attorio largely focused on his studies at school, dedicating himself to being able to assume the role of monarch far earlier than he had ever planned. The Astrolinium Herald reported that the young king was often found working late into the night, studying history, tactics, and politics in order to adequately prepare himself.

Attorio's first major state visit as King came on 10 May of 2011, when he made a visit to Little Gritta in the newly independent Grittonian Isles for the Casa Muerte Conference. The Astrolinium Herald called the visit "of dubious sense, given the reputation of Grittonia, particularly the infamous Vince, the 'porn prince'". Speaking in an interview with Royalty Today in April of that year, Attorio recounted that he had no idea what he was getting himself into when he responded to the invitation.

In May of 2011, Attorio applied for Astrolinium to join the World Assembly. This decision marked the beginning of Astrolinium's presence on the world stage. As the first Ambassador to the World Assembly, Attorio appointed his foreign secretary, Giovanni Romero, who has represented Astrolinium at the World Assembly ever since. Under the direction of the King, Astrolinium quickly became a familiar presence internationally.

On 12 June 2011, Astrolinium and the other Aelian islands were shaken by a magnitude 5.2 earthquake originating at a fault approximately 10km to the north of the island. There were no casualties, but some residents sustained minor injuries, and there was considerable structural damage to many of the island's older buildings.

Post-Earthquake (2011-Present)

With the help of aid from the neighboring nations of Eugepae and Malsitar, as well as from other allies, such as Mahaj, Astrolinium began to rebuild what it had lost in the earthquake. In a speech made in August of 2011, Attorio Maldive told the people that "this is a time to mourn, yes, but it is also a chance to rebuild, stronger than before". Taking the destruction as an opportunity, the King used the rebuilding process to modernize a number of structures in Astrolinium, laying underground power lines, widening several streets to accommodate automobile traffic, and replacing some of the more outdated buildings constructed in the 1980s, among other improvements.

The nation's morale was lifted during the rebuilding process when Titania Caspian, a music teacher at the Astrolinium School, entered and won the 3rd World Hit Festival for Astrolinium. To celebrate, the King held a festival in her honor in the newly reconstructed Market Square.

Following the rebuilding process, in September of 2011, Attorio Maldive announced the signing of a treaty with Malsitar and Eugepae which created an organization called the Aelian League, which allowed freer trade and movement between the nations of the Aelian Archipelago in exchange for mutual military protection. At the time, this treaty was heavily criticized for being done without any contribution from the People's Assembly, and because of its close proximity to the King's relationship with Petr Mülitív, which some thought to have been an unofficial benefit of the treaty. Additionally, the treaty involved the creation of a short-lived joint World Assembly Seat for Astrolinium and Malsitar.

Concurrent with this process, Attorio decreed the creation of Astrolinium's People's Assembly, a democratic law-proposing body open to all citizens. When interviewed by the Astrolinium Herald, he said, "Governing a whole people is no easy job. Especially for someone like me. I'm only sixteen, after all. But this is the responsibility I accepted on my father's deathbed - to govern his country - and I cannot let myself fail him. But I see no reason why I shouldn't share the responsibility with my people". While this decision was largely met with public support, there was vocal dissent, particularly from the King's own foreign secretary, Giovanni Romero, who went on the record as saying that "people are usually idiots".

In October of 2011, King Attorio Maldive III joined with Empress Ziniadyra Asarazyntk of the Dizyntk Imperium in establishing an embargo against the Holy Empire of Albicia over their status as a slave state. In December of 2011, at the 136th Astrolinialia, the King was gifted a Saunders-Roe Princess flying boat by the Crown Prince of Cosgravia, which he keeps to this day at Western Airfield. In April of 2012, the King himself appeared at the 7th World Hit Festival, firing an antique artillery piece as part of a tribute to war hero Mazimo Nasone. Unfortunately, Astrolinium only receive 3 votes that season, a far cry from its performance in World Hit Festival 3.

In June of 2012, Attorio Maldive made his infamous state visit to Rome. After absconding from his security with Francis, Prince of Naples, the King and the Prince are reported to have dressed themselves in common clothes and spent the day "blending in", as the King described it in a later interview with the Astrolinium Herald. Though it was later discovered that a local tabloid had taken a number of photos of the pair, the two were not found by their security until much later that evening, when they were located in a local dance club. The Daily Roman reported that the two may have been under the influence of cannabis and amphetamines, though the Office of the King officially denies this. Following the incident, it would be two weeks before the King reappeared publicly.

In September of 2012, Maldive made a grand reappearance on the world stage by attending the Pysskl Accords of the Stonewall Alliance. Ultimately, he had to leave the accords early due to food poisoning after eating bad fish on the flight over, but he later spoke favorably of the agreement reached. In November of that year, he donated generously out of his own pocket to give aid to the nation of Katyuscha, which was undergoing a budget crisis. Thanks in part to the aid provided by the King, the nation of Katyuscha still exists today.

In March of 2014, as part of other infrastructure reforms, the King began pushing for public support for public transportation in Astrolinium. After a successful campaign, he declared the creation of the Astrolinium Municipal Transit System, which currently consists of a single bus line on a twenty-minute loop, running an additional line out to the Ceremonial Meadow during festivals.

Personal life

Attorio is well known for his love of swimming and horse races, as well as a strong interest in independent films and impressionist art. He has also described himself as an amateur photographer, and is known to own at least twelve boats. He is, additionally, an avid chess player. He is often seen in the company of Marco Altieri, a long-time friend from his childhood. Reportedly, his favorite restaurant is Chesare, on Astrolinium's north shore tourism district.

Due in large part to his status as an openly gay monarch, the personal life of Attorio Maldive III has attracted considerable interest. Notable for a cavalier attitude towards both diplomacy and, at times, his own safety, the young king is known to frequent various international clubs and LGBT+ bars, and has become a common sight at pride parades. He has earned a somewhat rebellious reputation, having been sighted at nude beaches, wild yacht parties, and pool halls. Of peak concern was when, during a state visit to Rome in 2012, he and one of the princes managed to evade their security and disguise themselves as commoners for a day, being finally found later that night at a notable dance club.

Thus far, the only public romantic relationship Attorio Maldive III has had was with Petr Mülitív, son of the Malsitari Prime Minister, lasting from September of 2011 to May of 2012. The Sitaria Sun Times speculated that this relationship was primarily political, controversially referring to Mülitív as a "tasty prize for the King's cooperation with Malsitari interests" during that time.

Public perception

Over the six years that Attorio has reigned, he has become a controversial figure. Making divisive strides even before he assumed the crown when he came out, he has been nothing if not polarizing. He has been criticized on several occasions for his cavalier "party boy" attitude, with Joanna Cotton of Royalty Today writing in January 2015 that at times Attorio has seemed "more the King of Dance than an actual King". He has likewise received heavy criticism from the nationalist movement within Astrolinium for making diplomatic decisions which some have viewed as naïve. Most strikingly, the opinions section of the Astrolinium Herald has accused him on more than one occasion of being "little more than a puppet for his late father's advisors, with Dr. Romero holing the nation's real strings". While Dr. Romero is on record as saying, "God help us all, I couldn't influence him when his mind is made up if I tried", these accusations have persisted throughout his reign.

In spite of this, he has been hailed globally as a proponent of LGBT rights, often visiting areas which are typically considered unsafe for members of the LGBT community in order to promote what he views as "the fundamental rights" of his "fellow human beings". He has been noted as charming and charismatic, with Giovanni Romero citing the personal touch he gives to diplomacy as "the spark that will put him in the books some day". His aggressive command of the rebuilding campaign following the earthquake of 2011 has attracted praise from supporters and critics alike. In an interview with the Astrolinium Herald in 2012, Giosua Fontane said, "Is he the best king we've ever had? Not at the moment. Is what he's accomplished damned impressive for someone his age? You'd better believe it."