Yulai

The Farthest East

Far from even the eastern reaches of the Accord, Yulai is a green and verdant region east of Torangh, beyond the Sandseas and Plateaus of Leng, and beyond the Wall—a gargantuan structure that epitomizes the gravity and commitment of Yulai's once-great states to maintain order. While historians debate the origins and purpose of the Wall, the bastion of Shangdu stands in its shadow, serving as a gatekeeper to the vast, dead expanse of humid, tropical jungles to the south and swampy forests to the north. This diverse terrain of rolling hills and imposing mountainous columns, untouched by the glacial forces of the Highwinter, once sheltered one of Geron's most populous and diverse regions before the fall. Now, however, settlements decay under the control of bandit armies and rogue sorcerer-kings who cling to the ideologies of the past.

The Reach of the Old World

Despite Yulai's geographical and linguistic distance, before the Fall, the large markets of Anteros once contained curiosities from the distant port of Kirti, the southernmost and easternmost harbor of Ondukat at the edge of the Endless Sea. Many goods and ideas from this region also came through exchanges in the bazaars of Majya and the great roads of Ahzrakan, shuttling silk, paper, and other valuable goods westward. These items, while rare, became known commodities in what is now the Grand Accord. With these items came curiosities and fantasies about what lay behind Yulai's well-protected and insular territories, where the secrets of trade routes and contacts were passed down from generation to generation as a source of immense wealth and power.

The End of Empire

Before the Fall, the empire of Yulai coalesced and devolved over a series of wars stretching from the Age of River Kings to The Fall. Its enemies often included its own states and a myriad of cultures, ranging from The Hundred Tribes of the Yue, the rural Rong, the northern Shai, and the western Shongnu. This empire of shifting alliances and warring nation-states was in deep decay at the time of the Fall, with conflicts between generals, ideological groups, and cultural clades seeking control of a vast bureaucratic apparatus deeply ingrained into the region's way of life. While The Fall silenced the warring states and put an end to war within and outside the empire, little remains of the once vast legalist bureaucracy but Shangdu, saved from the ravages of the Shroud by the bulwark of the Wall. Asadal to the southeast again stands as an independent nation, and the colonies of Tsomokan exist quietly beyond Yulai's coast at the edge of the Endless Sea.