A more fallen Exalted World

In a world more broken.  The overthrow was more complete.  Of the three hundred Solars and the three hundred Lunars only fifteen Solar shards and half of the Lunar shards escaped eternal imprisonment in the Jade Prison.  The fifteen were the key to the state of the world and its more fallen state.  One of the Solars, a Night caste, had uncovered the plot to overthrow the Solar rule.  The counter plan was to let it happen.  A few of the Solars were thus prepared.  The rivalries of the God-Kings though were great and most of the Solars were not informed of the coming coup, and we're like children before the onslaught; rivals eliminated by the hands of the usurpers.  A few had hidden in the confines of a hidden fortress, but most were destroyed utterly.  Even those that came to the battle prepared fell, but the ruin they left was more complete than it would have been had they not been so prepared.  It was the younger Lunars that died with their Solar mates, compelled to the massacre as servants to their mates; the elder of their kind fled the abuse of their masters and thus saved themselves.  

The destruction was more complete.  Legions of Dragon Blooded and Sidereal warlords died when Manse Fortresses unexpectantly destabilized and exploded, obliterating them and the surrounding city and towns; only a few cities escaped such fates.  The Lap sits as it did in the headless lap of the great artifact known as the Penitant Monk, the consul that regulated the flows of energy in the entire South, destroyed.  The loss of control altered Dragon Lines, moved some and every manse and demesne in the south weakened or strengthened seemingly randomly.  Manses on stronger demesne than they were designed to handle, exploded while others produced less essence and other none at all.  For generations the people that survived were nomadic and avoided all cities as buildings were considered unlucky.  It was so for centuries, until the invasion of the Wyld forced them there for mutual protection.  The entire south to this day is as well populated as the North and the West.  The North coast is controlled completely by the Realm with only a few exceptions.  Paragon grows and prospers, a city that formed well after the troubled times.  Habourhead, the nation that is nominally ruled by the priesthood of Ahlat.  

However, there is a few good things here.  The scant opposition in the south to the Wyld invasion meant that the influence on it was more pronounced; Shadowlands being the antithesis of untamed potential were wiped clean unless they were very big.  The shattered remains of Chiaroscuro are more shattered, there is only a few undamaged towers, they are all in Grandmother Bright's domain, all other towers are blasted down to a few stories in height or in the central region, melted off at that height.  The central core of the city is a barren field, the site of the former powerful Manse once stood, obliterated during the Usurpation.  The city itself is small and like the city splintered into factions, under the leadership of the Trikhan government in the the hut community in the central fields.  

In the East, things are more stable and populous.  Cities are larger and more numerous.  The Bronze Age seems to flourish here, there is great distruction of in the old centers: there is no Factory Cathedral in Lookshy, the First Age buildings are shorn off partway between floors through Nexus.  The walls between Creation and the Underworld are thinner everywhere, but with the larger populations and the more fertile land, the people are more vigilant about stopping up the threats of minor shadowlands.  The Hundred Kingdoms are more wide spread to the North and to the South.  A more prolific Terrestrial Exalted population has resulted in many more smaller nations and a few larger stronger nations.  The Immaculate Philosophy is wide spread here too as it serves the Manifest Destiny of e Dragon Blooded.  There are more Realm Outposts dotting the lands, but the local Exalted play them, due to their greater strength of numbers and the distance to the Realm.  

In the West, there are more people.  The seas are plentiful with life and the many islands support many people and Dragon Blooded too.  There are many floating towns dotting the seas, barges and ships lashed together for protection; they roam the seas as self sustaining communities, trading for things they cannot produce.

The North is bleak and a mix of Wyld and Shadowlands.  The in-between places are weak and are holed easily.  The human stead fasts hold it all together but they are far apart.  

The Realm itself is diminished.  The core of the Old Realm, the center of it all.  More manses were destroyed here, more carnage.  Greatest City of all Meru collapsed sooner and more thoroughly in the initial fighting during the Usurpation.  Great city blocks rained down upon the surface after a fall of ten thousand meters and impacted the surface, the great power grid failed here completely and the destruction was near total.  Only the defense grid escaped damage and then it was years before the Dragon lines sorted themselves out enough to defend Creation.  

After the Usurpation, the Millions strong Dragon blooded aegis had been reduced to a ruinous few thousand.  The rebuilding process began at once and  in the five hundred years between the Usurpation and the invasion of the Fair Folk, the numbers were increased to tens of thousands and lesser wonders were restored to Creation.  Manses were rebuilt, demesnes capped to a maximum of three; the art of greater geomancy lost.  Demon hordes were summoned to clear the debris of the successful attack.   

The Contagion was a surprise; it swept through the mortal populations and Dragon Blooded like wildfire, one in ten lived.  When the Fair Folk invaded, the population of exalted was tired from years of labour and the bring down of Solars who escaped that Final battle and lastly that great plague. From less than one hundred thousand lesser exalted, a few tens lived.

When the smoke cleared from the Wyld plowing of Creation, the Dragon-blooded were scattered and reduced to a few hundred.  Lone individuals in the West and the East, military units nearer the center.  From these Creation was reformed.  The Realm and Lookshy, the individuals carved out small empires and bred with the mortals.  Carful population management in the Realm and Lookshy allowed the Dragon Blooded empires to build and control more and more of the region.  While only a few Exalted in the hinterlands were able to do the same.  

After more than three quarters of a millennium, the Realm controls half of a great host of a hundred thousand Dragon Blooded, Lookshy a fifth of what remains while the unrestricted unmanaged breeding elsewhere has resulted in the remaining crop.  Given a few more centuries, the hinterlands would likely outnumber all of the Exalted of the Dragons in the Ream and Lookshy combined many times over.