Matuni
Matuni is the northernmost of the five major continents of the rew of Dadauar. It is also on average the coldest continent, with nearly half the continent lying in the pageric zone—though the continent's western half is in the temperate zone and has less extreme climate—as is true of its easternmost tip.
Geography
Matuni is roughly rectangular in shape, albeit with the corners stretched out into narrow, acutangular points. A large mountain range, the Kafuzi, spans the continent from west to east; a slightly smaller range, the Zsemnye, runs northeast from the southernmost corner of Matuni to meet the Kafuzi at the continent's center. A single skyfall, the Longwater, bisects the continent from northwest to southeast; it carves out several canyons in the land beneath it, which broaden into the Fallen Lake in the northern part of the continent and the Inlet of Vyre on its southern shore.
Matuni is the continent that lies closest to the edge of the rew, its northernmost tip (Ice Cape) only 275 kilometers from the edge, and its westernmost point (the Cape of Stars) only about eight kilometers more distant from it. Between these two capes is the most remote and inaccessible part of Dadauar's circumferent ocean, the Northern Sea. To the east, Matuni borders the Nubilous Ocean, to the west, the Camilout Ocean, and to the south, the White Main.
The Tanahire Archipelago lies close enough to the western point of Matuni that it is also sometimes considered part of the continent, though the shelves of the archipelago and Matuni are not contiguous, being separated by the Metingan Trench.
Life
While almost half of Matuni lies in Dadauar's pageric zone, even this part of the continent is not without life. The flora of this area consists largely of lichens, with a few hardy grasses and other plants, and some rare, twisted trees that thrive in the cold. While technically animals, the ubiquitous photosynthetic icestars also supplement the bottom layer of the food chain. These apparently scanty resources nevertheless support a wide variety of fauna, from mites and insects through small rodents and lizards up through great beasts like the galabus, the hulthack, and the dinalere. There are also a number of semiaquatic creatures that spend much of their time in the frigid water but come up onto the land to rest or breed, such as the walrus, the tatacar, and various types of penguin.
A greater variety of wildlife, or at least a more visible variety of wildlife, lives in the temperate western part of the continent. The swamps are the home of the lurking satarn and the acidic greenfly; the forests of the shambling kalmarschar and the clever cerkinule; the mountains of the ungainly flutehorn and the blind cappleworm. Western Matuni also seems to be the original home of the b'rac and the ctsorven, though like most other kinds of gnulu they have since spread across most of the rew.
Politics
As cold as eastern Matuni is, it is not unsettled by civilized folks. Most of the frozen part of Matuni is taken up by an assortment of small, contentious kingdoms collectively called the Ice Realms. The borders of the Ice Realms are constantly shifting, as one kingdom seizes some territory from another or conquers it completely, or a part of a kingdom declares independence and becomes a separate state. While the Ice Realms are not formally claimed by any onirarchy, many of the kings have thrown in their lot with one or the other onirarch and enjoyed the power their patrons grant over their rivals, and thus much of the constant skirmishing going in in this area consists essentially of proxy wars for the onirarchs jockeying for dominion over this cold corner of the world, or at least for bragging rights. Some resistance elements have also tried to establish a foothold among the Ice Realms, but since they have less to offer the rulers, at least in terms of raw power, they have a harder time winning them to their side.
This is not to say the onirarchies do not have a more direct presence in the pageric zone, however. The northwestern part of the zone is occupied by E Ganir, a colony of the Burcadian nation of Ovla Ba. Like Ovla Ba, E Ganir is covered by organic living matter grown by the onirarchs, but consisting of very different organisms than Ovla Ba itself.
Of course, it is outside the pageric zones that the most populous nations of Matuni are located. Along the western shore lie the nations of Cselya, Olori, and Taumury, all of which have by one means or another avoided takeover by the onirarchs and remain independent undeveloped nations. In the northwestern tip of the continent is Alfenane, an onirarchy notorious for the superstition of its citizens—and for the presence of the Lookout, a structure that overhangs the edge of the rew that was built by Alfenane and is connected to it by a long bridge. Matuni's volcanic eastern headland is occupied mostly by the onirarchy of Dhuraak.
History
The history of Matuni before the Great Plague is a little better preserved than elsewhere in Dadauar, though admittedly this is a low bar to clear. It seems the ravages of the Plague did not hit eastern Matuni quite as hard as the rest of the rew, perhaps because the plague pathogens did not thrive as well in the cold temperatures, perhaps because its sparse population slowed the spread of the disease, or perhaps due to a combination of these factors—some in the Ice Realms claim that their ancestors repressed the plague with powerful magics, but this, while not entirely impossible, seems unlikely, and has no real evidence behind it. About the tales of a powerful empire that spanned most of the continent, only to eventually split into the warring kingdoms of the modern Ice Realms, historians are likewise dubious; while it's entirely possible that there was once a larger nation in Matuni's pageric zone than any of the modern Ice Realms, its size and power have almost certainly been exaggerated.
What is considered reasonably certain is that Matuni was the last of Dadauar's five continents to have been settled by humans, its first immigrants having come across the Luruga Strait from Burcady. These would become the Muzu, the ancestors of the earliest people of western Matuni. Eastern Matuni was first settled some time later by another people crossing the Strait of Mazara; their descendents were the Qaaqiaq, who would later give rise to the earliest people of what is now the Ice Realms. It is the latter that have left the most complete records of preloimic Matuni, but these records, which include many long and elaborate sagas, are concerned mostly with local matters, and what little they say about contemporary western Matuni is vague and probably unreliable. There are many stories of a mysterious folk called the Kinnirak that lived in Matuni before the arrival of humanity but have since vanished, but the accounts and descriptions are contradictory, and many historians doubt the Kinnirak ever existed outside of myths—and even attempts at magical divination have proved frustratingly inconclusive about the matter.
In any case, in the immediate aftermath of the plague the population of western Matuni was on par with that of the frozen east. Within a few centuries after the Plague, however, western Matuni was taken over by Tanahiran invaders, and became the first conquest of the incipient Tanahiran Empire. While the Empire never bothered to expand beyond the fringes of the frigid zone, leaving the Ice Realms mostly alone—and even then the Ice Realms seemed to be already much as they are today—, it did conquer much of Burcady and even part of Avelax, though the empire's Avelachian holdings were lost to the Pall several centuries before the rest of the empire fell.
About a thousand years after the fall of the Tanahiran Empire, another empire would rise in western Matuni, the Uruchathian Empire. Unlike the Tanahiran Empire, the Uruchathian Empire did spread across the pageric zone as well, and even the Ice Realms were at least nominally a part of it—the first and last time since the Great Plague that they would ever be united as part of a larger sovereign state. The Uruchathian Empire would spread into Burcady and Eordi and even establish colonies in Jahanna before it in turn fell. Since then, other empires have claimed parts of the continent, but none have established their capitals there.
Just as Matuni was apparently the last continent reached by humanity, it was also the last to feel the fists of the onirarchies. Onirarchies already existed on all four other continents before the Drithidian Empire finally spread to Matuni, and not longer after the continent's first independent onirarchy, Mhahali, arose on the Green Cape. Neither was to last; the Drithidian Empire eventually fell as had the older empires before the Dreaming Age, and Mhahali was overthrown by rebellious citizens. Still, both sites later birthed other onirarchies, and over the next few millennia the political structure of Matuni would gradually evolve to its present condition.