Update 13: 500 Years
Agvant
In the far east, the Kang are a subgroup of Ongans live at the jagged edge of the world, the bitter wall of ice and rock known as the Kal- the 'End'. For these people, there surely can be nothing beyond, and they cling to a harsh existence between cold and unforgiving sea and glacial peaks.
However, to the south, one group of Ongans have found a narrow set of passes across the Kal. Christening themselves the Yagakalanai, this hardy folk now begin to spread into an unpeopled new land.
Animal domestication has become a major driver of human development in interior Agvant. The Jaka, descendants of the Jakkan, have begun to domesticate horses, one of the native animals of their arid grassland belt. Originally prized for their meat, the Jaka have found that they make fine draft beasts as well, and increasingly use them to carry goods and haul sledges. This useful domesticate has greatly increased their success, and while it hasn't given them much success surviving in the brutal deserts of the south, it has helped them to drive west against the inland Agvanti.
The Jaka enjoy a healthy trading relationship with the Aggai, relatives of the more northerly Aggan. While the Jaka are a major threat to those living on their own latitude, they have little interest in the taiga, and are content to live and let live with the northerners.
Further still to the north, the Tevanti have spread widely across the coast, growing increasingly adept as hunters of large aquatic mammals.
South of the central desert, the Kantihak have begun to take advantage of another native organism, the camel. While by no means fully domesticated, camels have proven their use as pack animals, and their ability to survive in extreme arid conditions has allows the Kanithak to push further than any other culture into the dunes.
Further still to the south, llamas, distant relatives of the camel, are coming to be used by the Gozvai, offshoots of the Gozvant who have migrated into the alpine valleys of the Zahak Mountains.
Agvanti mariners have spread widely, establishing trading relationships and settlements with people all across the south coast. Off the coast of Hasavant, the Agvanti intermarry heavily with the locals, giving rise to the Uwanti, a maritime people who have come to dominate a volcanic island chain extending off the misty jungle tip of Agvant.
The barrier between Agvant and Wabana has steadily eroded in the face of ever-increasing trade. Desire for Agvanti treasures, furs and other animal products in Wabana, and for refined Wabanan goods in Agvant fueled a highly competitive trade. On both sides of the sea, Agvans, Vannady and Nangvantis profited richly by controlling this trade, their coastal peoples growing in wealth and power as they served as middlemen between the Eban peoples to the west and the Agvanti proto-states around the Pagana River.
Driven in pursuit of profits, and out of a desire to bypass these middlemen, Paganan traders dared further and further into the ocean. With outriggers and durable clinker ship designs, derived from those of the Eban, the Paganans pioneered open ocean trade routes. While dangerous and unreliable at first, the benefits proved to outweigh the risks, and within a few centuries regular direct trade was taking place between the Pagana and the Wabban. The Wabana to Agvant passage has proven to be much easier to make, as prevailing winds and currents allow vessels to skip along the coastline, but the reverse passage often involves a harrowing passage through the open waters of the Dalbaran Sea.
Wabana
Ongoing exchanges up and down the coast, and with the interior, make the Eban complex one of the most dynamic regions of the world. In the centuries following the initial expansion of the Agagabaan, the various Eban cultures, from the Agvans in the north to the edges of the Sueva jungles in the south, grew into closer and closer economic contact with each other.
The spread of the writing loom, and the two writing systems of the region, helps to enable greater degrees of societal organization. Textile communication and literacy spread increasingly through priestly classes, and the rulership and their servants. Eban architecture grows steadily larger and more impressive, as the lower Togora River becomes a major center of textile manufacture, and thus a region of major wealth accumulation.
On the island of Boron, the rapid expansion phase of the Habaan slows, and new cultures emerge from the milieu. Across the northern fringe of the island, the Obuus, isolated from their more urbanized southern neighbours and subject to significant Habaan influence, give rise to the Yobuu, largely a sea-focused culture and skilled fishermen. On the interior coast, the Obuus are heavily influenced by the Ebon colonies, coming to be known as the Buuson. The Ohbahn expanded their portion of the coast, holding the most densely developed section of the island, while the Obuus proper were largely confined to the southeastern corner of the isle.
Meanwhile, the Habaan continued to dominate the interior, although the steady growth of the richer coastal regions saw their influence steadily wane throughout this period. Gradual splits also began to diverge their culture, as the more settled south and rustic north began to drift apart, giving rise to the southern Apa'an.
On the Hashon River, the Agagabaan steadily continued to migrate in from the countrysides to the cities. As a result, Agagabaan power and influence steadily grew in the richest, central lands once dominated by the Ebon, dividing the Ebon between their coastal southern population, and an increasingly isolated north.
Through warfare, city states and small kingdoms coalesce on the Togora, ultimately leading to the rise of the Agagat of Ethandal Cities. Overcoming their longtime rivals, the Obaram Corsair-Kings (descendants of the Ohbahns who settled on the coast during Agagag's invasions), Ethandal established a dynasty that ruled the lower Togora for nearly three centuries. However, this early empire would eventually begin to crumble back into its constituent parts, before being decisively ended by famine and invasion.
The Obo 'Dog-People' of the Wabanan interior had lived with few material changes to their lives for countless thousands of years. However, the coming of a period of great cold and famine to this northerly people and their cousins, particularly the Hobok, prompted broad southerly migrations.
The Hobot culture was one of the descendant cultures of this migration. Traveling the least far, they overwhelmed the Upoh, settling heavily in the uppermost reaches of the Eastern Wab River.
The Oxok, meanwhile, were of mixed Hobok-Obo descent, and moved further to the east, interacting heavily with the Wabban and northern Ebon cultures. While the Oxok were not initially aggressive, their sudden arrival and additional strains on the natural resources of the region swiftly led to conflicts, as the natives fought to reject these new arrivals. The conflicts intensified in destructiveness, in some places even bringing down whole urban areas, and would continue to burn for centuries thereafter.
It was the Oybat who were responsible for the downfall of the Ethandal Agagat. Perhaps the most well-led and organized of the three major migratory groups, the Oybat claim to hail from the northernmost mountains, and spent some time among the Hobot and Oxok lands before pressing further south, towards the greatest prize, the great cities of the lower Togora River. Deftly assessing the deteriorating situation in the Agagat, the Oybats aligned themselves with the Ahban cities which had not aligned themselves with the imperial effort, and with their settled allies struck a fatal blow to the Ethandal cities. This invasion presented a major disruption to the increasingly interconnected economy of the Eban complex, but in the greater scale of centuries the disruption was relatively short-lived. A short century after their initial migration, the Togora River was a collection of small, bickering polities once again. While the Oybat had come in search of food, and later, wealth, in time they became just another powerful element that became a part of the Eban complex, often jostling with the Agagabaan for position and prominence.
In the southern rainforests, the Arpam are steadily diminished by the growth of the Sueva. Some particularly adventurous Agagabaan push a short distance into the region, but find little there that they could not more easily trade for. Further west, the Veyaba and Gueba continue to push back and forth, intermingling in the gulf at the southern cape of the continent.
The Veyaj, Slaver-Kings and fearsome warriors, continue to dominate the lower Wab delta. A diverse land, the Kings continue to only grow in opulence and splendour, remaining in place in spite of regular spates of slave revolts. However, the raiding of the Vejaka, who draw in a great proportion of the captive slaves who power the Veyaj engine, have had a transformative impact on the Hoppa further upstream. Mobile 'Cattle Lords' have formed compacts with their fellow herders and the cities along the river, striking back in earnest against the hated Vejaka. As this militarization and stratification gradually spreads through Hoppa society, so too spreads a Bull Cult, emerging dominant over the traditional animal pantheon and nature reverence which remains common among the Wayha.
With these developments, the Hoppa have grown into a significant isolated urban civilization, the largest and most populous west of the Wab delta. The other major cultures of the west, the Wobao and Wobaoh, continue to fend off the depredations of the Baoyaj, who steadily encroach further and further up the coast. Meanwhile, driven south by the same factors affecting the northeastern Obos and their kin, the Ap have migrated south into Wobao lands, forming the Oepao culture.
Apala
In the great rainforest of northern Apala, life continues apace. The Webwayo continue to thrive around their rich bay, enjoying the fruits of both the sea and the forest. Recently, they have begun trading in trinkets of metal too, as the Huepak of the mountains ship their wares downriver to the coast. This relationship has richly benefited both cultures, and have made the Webwayo into one of the most prominent of the equatorial civilizations.
On the coast beyond the northern cape, the Voyahm and the Weway vie for control, with the aggressive Voyahm gradually driving back their native neighbours. In some areas, the absorption of a Voyahm overclass into the Weway substrate has led to the formation of the Vehar culture, who have become a populous force which now dominate the former southern reaches of Weway territory. The Wabaha remain dominant over the bulk of their great river. The Kptp, Apa'nuk and Avenec remain the dominant people of the hinterlands, with the former being the most dynamic. As the Kptp establish themselves on the upper branches of the Great River of the Wabaha, they intermingle increasingly with the eponymous Wabahas, giving rise to the Kopu.
Further south, things also remain steady on the Abhwal river, with an equilibrium of power existing between its various peoples. It is beyond the edges of the vast, continent-spanning jungle that major changes have unfolded, largely driven by the interplay between the civilizations of the Itap and the Gero Valley.
For countless millennia, the Vamalo have been a mobile people, traveling the Vama'taho Savanna, hunting, gathering and trading. Their role as middlemen, however, has recently been disrupted by the conquests of the Itap Ghuchagates, whose military campaigns have formed a much tighter link between these two cradles of civilization. In response, many Vamalo shifted their travel routes, now connecting the Abhwals and Hakhaks on the edge of the great rainforest with the Itap. This Vamalo subgroup, the Vakwela, have formed trade routes short-circuiting the lengthy and contested route down the rivers, across the coast and up the Gero Valley, bringing exotic jungle goods directly to the Itap. This has introduced yet more strange animal gods and fetishes to the Ghuchagh, and brought contemporary technologies to the rainforest backwaters. The great wealth this has brought to the Vakwela has been transformative to their culture, many of whom are able to make a living from merchantry alone, and now travel by antelope-drawn wagon, in great caravans. However, in spite of these material changes, they have remained true to their ancestral traditions of gift exchange and lunar observance.
History across the densely-populated southern band during this period was heavily impacted by the catastrophic eruption of Yerafram, a massive volcano previously only known to the Makyerf as a place of regular earthquakes and geothermal activity, which provided a much-desired source of hot water in their cold, southerly home.
The initial Yerafram Eruption blew the top off of the mountain, flattening forests and raining molten debris hundreds of kilometers away from the epicentre. After the initial cataclysm, the ruined crater would belch a toxic, black cloud into the sky for several years, punctuated with further violent eruptions nearby. The Makyerf were devastated by this, but the impacts were felt much more widely than just in the Makayari Reach and surrounding lands. The black cloud rose high into the atmosphere, occluding sunlight across the southern hemisphere, and even spreading north of the equator, where it had climatic impacts as far away as Wabana, where it contributed to the collapse of Ethandal civilization.
In the Reach, water became undrinkable and crops died off en masse. The northern Makyerf, who had not been directly hit by the eruption, starved alongside the other joined the other various peoples of the region in starving. The Kubako and Kiryaks were also harshly depopulated, as life became nigh-untenable in the region. The ocean and rivers, upon which they depended, became barren. Wracked by famine, the Kiryak population outright collapsed on the mainland. Offshore, the coastal Kiryaks suffered the same fate, and human life was maintained on their island only by the Huiet, the materially impoverished cousins of the Kiryaks who had lost out in the competition for prime fishing and hunting grounds, and instead subsisted on hunting small birds and mammals, and scavenging. Lacking the maritime tradition of the Kiryaks, the Huiet are now wholly isolated.
Back to the mainland, not all people were wiped out immediately by this cataclysm. The Mkyaph, for example, were highly mobile. Alongside the Makyerf and Tiryats, they flooded north into the Timika Sea, bringing an additional complicating factor to an already contested and swiftly-degrading region. As crops failed, the Yana and Tiriyata were the first to suffer. The Kaya and the new southern arrivals were quick to depredate on the farmers, and warred intensely with each other for control over limited food resources. Rapidly recognizing that there was no future to be had in the region, the remaining powers in the region set their sights on areas that were less drastically impacted. Some tried to cross the Great Sand Ocean, but precious few made it across that expanse, often losing all of their possessions to the Ixyah. The clans of the desert, at this same time, were undergoing major societal developments, possibly influenced by the Ghughagates of the Itap, developing increasingly entrenched castes, a trend shared across all of the major Ikyp-derived nomadic cultures.
Most southerners recognized the Great Sand Ocean for what it was, an impassable barrier, and knowing the south to be uninhabitable, were funneled either to the east or west. The mounted Mkyaph drove west through the Myakaps and Makyerfs, settling heavily among the lands of the Makapo and Wombax. These coastal cultures had already been long-threatened by inland Efern-riders, and with the collapse of oceanic resources had even less ability to resist than normal. Thus did the coast become a confused jumble of migrants resting atop a substrate of native Makapos and Wombax. In the midst of this great movement of humanity, the venerable Wabakos have disappeared altogether as a distinct group, through a mix of depopulation and loss of cultural distinctiveness and and unity in the face of this massive shift.
Within a few decades, the Apalan southwest was on the mend, although the major demographic changes would continue to resolve themselves for centuries thereafter. Descendants of Makyerfs, the Mogiev, settled much of the old Kubako and northern Kiryak coast, and the Mkyaph-derived Megya repopulated the inland Makayari. The Turiga, last survivors of the old Tiriyata, carry on on the northern coast, while the Mkyaph establish themselves in the south once again. However, agriculture has almost entirely collapsed in the region, and urbanization has been dealt a major setback.
Distinct from the westward exodus from the Timika Sea and Makayari Reach was the eastward flight of the Kaya Tiryats, who flooded up the Aptira, toward the Itap. The Kaya had few compunctions in slaughtering their eastern neighbours, Nekra, Ziag and Tiryap, particularly with their very survival on the line, allowing them to carve out a significant portion of land between the Iksiph and Ypta Mountains. The arrival of these westerners in the lands of the Ziyuzagh presented a major challenge for the Ghuchagh, whose decentralized structure was slow to adopt a coordinated response against a large and desperate outsider population of nomadic beast-riders.
Further complicating matters was the ongoing famine ravaging the region due to declining agricultural yields. The nominally united Ghuchagh became clearly divided, as rivalries arose between different shamanic alliances. With hunger, growing warlordism and a failure of temporal authority, conflict broke out once again on the bloodstained sea. Now, various forces attempt to assert their broad, or at least local authority over the region, even as the Kaya continue to struggle to establish themselves in the southwest.
While chaos befell the southwest, the north and east remained relatively more orderly throughout this lean period. The people of the water, resurgent with their restored alliances with drylanders, have begun to throw their weight around, aiding the long-beleaguered Coa people in re-establishing their right to exist on the eastern coast of Holy Itaro. Meanwhile, mixed Ku and Goa called 'Golo' have settled the Gero River, their fortunes waxing with those of the Siyusayep invaders in the region.
Generations of Siyusayep migration and invasion into the western Gero Valley have gradually given rise to distinct Sierap and Dieruef cultures, which remain broadly affiliated with the Ghuchagate, such as it is. The same famine that is wracking many of the world's temperate and northern regions has also destabilized the Gero Valley. Faced with the persistent invasions by Siyusayep, many of the Dierhua city-states have forged alliances with their neighbours. However, grudges run deep on the Gero, and there are many who would be happy to see the Dierhua knocked from their position of preeminence. Various Gerdho alliances took advantage of the chaos and launched campaigns against the Dierhua on the eastern bank, in some cases aided by the Querhua of the northern coast. The Sierhua vaccillated between fighting and aiding the Dierhua cities, and defending their own lands against the Sierap. Meanwhile, the Diafo and Amalyo were broadly subjugated beneath the invaders, with very few of their polities remaining under their own rule. The Jero, for their part, remained largely aloof from the conflicts, thriving as their focus turned increasingly to the sea.
In the far southeast of Apala, the situation has remained relatively stable in spite of the famine, which admittedly was not as severe in the Long Sea and Yakgu Rifts as it was elsewhere. On the outer coast, urbanization continues among the Aeger, Urbala and Surazal, who run a bustling trade with their counterparts across the rifts. The Sierda and Daryava maintain their longstanding conflict, but ultimately remain in a long-term stalemate with their hated rivals. The Nyamaba, meanwhile, look elsewhere, and spread steadily across the Aegal Plains to settle in the west, rubbing shoulders with the Orbal.
In the far south, the climatic disruptions have put several people on the move, as the Omotog migrate northwards, much to the chagrin of the Matagya, while the Diryaj spread more widely westwards, into the depopulated lands of the Tiryats.
Epua
The Htckt and their kin butt heads with the Chepko and theirs. Broadly speaking, these more recent arrivals to Epua can be placed into four categories. First are the Wabaha-derived Chepko, Pueko and Tsebueh, who hunt and gather, staying mostly in coastal and riverine areas. Second are the Htckt and Otkt, derived from the Echp, who practice seasonal hunts and periodic burning. Third are the coastal raiders, Lptchp, Kachk and Khkchkt, who practice a somewhat more extreme variant of the Htckt faith of the all-consuming serpent. Finally are the Tkt, who retain significant aspects of their original Htckt faith, but have otherwise adopted the Epuan Poa system of land management, and do not live in a way that is fundamentally different from those that they displaced.
Central Epua develops more advanced Poa practices, managing to use the land more intensely than ever before. The priestly class, whose rituals grow constantly in complexity and scale, are joined by a middleman 'storage' class, the Powayaba, who trade with the people practicing the seasonal rounds, serving a valuable role in making sure that different goods can be made available at all times. The wealth of the Poyaba provides the resources to support a stable warrior class, adopting the mantle of the Dream-Eagle, defender against the Eastern Serpent. Thus, for the first time, the Epuans are able to mount something resembling an orderly defense against the Khkchkt and other coastal raiding cultures. Mounting counteroffensives, Dream Eagles have turned the slaughter against these reavers, stunting their further growth and expansion through the continent.
Little affects the Heben, as they carry on much as they have for millennia in the northern interior drylands. Meanwhile, the advanced Poa system of the central continent steadily makes its way into the southwest via the Yopuo. In the central western mountains, the Ka'Pua'Ne and Yoho have both crossed the high passes to find habitable plateaus, giving rise to the Kabwa and Yo Cho cultures respectively.
The swirling milieu of cultures in southwestern Epua are recombining and emerging into distinct new iterations, combining ideas old and new in the rich basin of the Huntwap'an.
In the fertile mountain valleys on the fringes of the Huntwap'an basin, the cultivation of tubers leads to a significant increase in food production. This has led to significant leaps in population density, and subsequent increases in conflict between neighbouring groups, some of whom have developed lasting feuds with one another. The Akhaba became highly influential during this time, spreading cliff tomb culture across the whole region, as far afield as the northern Yoho. Religious ideas spread along with them, involving mummification and varying degrees of ancestor worship, as well as the construction of monolithic monuments to the dead. On the fringes of the region, the Orepo people syncretize their traditional dreamways with the ancestral shrines of the southwesterners, taking these man-made monuments to be loci and gates anchoring the dreamway.
Meanwhile, on the inner rim of the basin, the Kha'kpa and Hwapa begin to fish increasingly intensively, achieving a similar growth in population. At their intersection arise the Senshu'pa. As their population soars, the Senshu'pa experience increasing social stratification, and their burial mounds grow increasingly grandiose. The Senshu'pa have to view the dreamways as being in tension between two supernatural forces, one constructive and the other degenerative.
The Senshu'pa have thrived on the northern shore of the Huntwap'an Sea, largely at the expense of the Orepo and Yoyepuo. However, the Senshu'pa have not expanded far beyond the coastline and the lower reaches of the rivers, as their cousins have come to adopt Poa practices, which gives them a highly effective system system for managing the resources of the jungle away from the major waterways.