The Collapse

The Collapse of the Yemil-Mezzian Portal Network spelled the end of the Hegemony as a result of four main factors.

1. The Hegemony was not set up for overland travel - there were no major roads between cities or even trade routes, which had been unnecessary while the Network was operational.

2. At the same time as the network collapse there was a resurgence of monstrous invaders from the wild lands.

3. The Hegemony's Elite Armies were not sufficient to resist the invaders without the capacity to move around the Hegemony freely and easily.

4. The Hegemony's revenues were dependent on Portal fees, leaving the Hegemony effectively bankrupt.

Thus in just a few years Yemil-Mez was no more. Most of civilisation was overwhelmed by the monsters pouring out of the wilds and facing minimal resistance. The few cities that survived the collapse of the Hegemony were those lucky enough to have large contingents of troops within their domains on the day the network failed.

The fractured Hegemony devolved into a large number of city states and provinces where the humanoid races once more had to struggle merely to survive. The golden age was no more.

When the portal network collapsed it was soon discovered that pretty much all transportation magic no longer worked. New portals could not be opened, interplanar access was impossible. Daugveidu had effectively dropped out of the multiverse. Short range teleportation still works. Conjuration still works but it is a slow process. Many interplanar entities were trapped on Daugveidu at the collapse and these can be summoned but it takes the form of a compulsion to travel to the summoner, they do not simply appear when called.

Daugveidu still has access to the ethereal and astral planes but only in a localised way, it has access to the region of those planes that corresponds to the material plane of Daugveidu.

THE REAL STORY - The collapse of the Portal network marks the moment when the Slug finally fully corrupted the first facet of the worldcrystal.