The Ruins of the Regalia

The rise and fall of races and otherworldly powers enabled the Regals to found an empire and occupy much of the known world until without warning the imperial capitol was destroyed as if overnight, claiming the Emperor, the city of Aurelion, all its people, and anyone who came to seek answers. Without the blood of the Bull to rule the Regalia, that great, united empire crumbled, fracturing to civil wars, land disputes, resource shortages, famine and fear. Old enemies of the empire began to stand to take advantage of the power vacuum; diabolic spawn of the malabrandi, patient and vengeful elven nations, dormant dragons given new hunger and incursions of fey and fiend and flame and frost as peoples older still scramble to claim new territories. In a world that is broken, with war slowly growing to throttle the world, the people look to the past, finding wisdom and strength in the examples of the Regalia, in the embrace and aegis of their shared gods, and within the legendary histories of their own kind to find the resolve and the right to step forward and seize control of the ruins of the Regalia.
As rogue states rise and fall, deities are set askew by widespread social upheaval, and the fate of entire races hangs in the balance, waiting for just a few individuals to take control and become the next great leaders of the age. Order begins to crack and cry out for revolution, Authority begins to fade and stand resolute against prophecy, and Fate dances a dervish across the face of the world as the march of civilisation stumbles, raising up heroes and villains alike that struggle in vain against one another, for there can be no true Emperor until the relics of the Regalia are found by the anointed heir, and its people united beneath one banner.