Region

In the world of The Dhavas, a **region**is the most powerful territorial unit (although the Mani Taming Association, or MTA, holds significant power over mani-taming in nine of the ten regions). Governed by humans, there are ten regions in total. They vary wildly in population and area. The territory of the regions do not comprise the entirety of the Earth's area; massive swathes of unincorportated territory still exist in the Westlands.

## Geography

Earth in the universe of *The Dhavas* consists of one large continent, as well as two major peninsulae stretching down well into the southern hemisphere: the Westlands and the Eastlands, themselves separated by the Nebinese and Jodhanese Seas. The two are connected by a large swath of mostly-uninhabited land, the Northlands; with the exception of this area's coastline, which is controlled by Nebi, the Northlands are uninhabited by humans and mostly uninhabited by manis. The vast majority of humans live in the Eastlands, the area of which has been almost entirely incorporated into regions. Five regions are located solely in the Eastlands; he sparsely-populated regions of Miskún and Nebi are located along the corridor between the Eastlands and Westlands; two regions are island chains; and then, in the Westlands, there are parts of Nebi and the West Cities, which are sparsely-populated, in addition to the more densely-populated Laca region. The majority of the Westlands is unincorporated, leaving it for manis to freely roam without human interference; the possibility of humans incorporating, settling, visiting, or otherwise interfering with the remainder of the Westlands is a fiercely-debated political topic.

## Regions

† The Federation of Western City States has special conditions underlying its MTA membership; through these conditions, mani-taming is legal in Clearport City, the capital of the region, but strictly forbidden elsewhere in the region outside the city limits.

†† Corona has never been a member of the MTA, and has expressed no interest in joining; it has its own taming regulation board, the Corona Bureau of Taming Regulation (BTC). Generally, the BTC offers little to no regulation over mani-taming within the region, making Corona a haven for illicit mani training, unregulated exhibition or to-the-death fights, corporate mani farms, and genetic modification. Many of the shady dealings done in Corona are not even legal within the region's loose legal framework, but enforcement is relatively lax.

## The regions and mani-taming

The regions form the basic geographic delineation of mani-taming, which is the core element of the majority of the regions' societies; all regions excepting Corona are part of the MTA, which means that they accept the MTA's regulations in mani rights and tamer ettiquette, as well as hosting regional House headquarters and MTA circuits of ten or fifteen camps, or groups of competitive mani tamers that outside tamers must battle either to join or to win regional certification.

Besides Corona, the other major exception to mani-fighting within regions is the Federation of Western City States (West Cities). The region most geographically isolated from other regions, due to its location on the southeastern tip of the Westlands, initially it was founded as a colony where humans could exist independently from manis, on the argument that mani-taming is both detrimental to humans (as stripping away their uniqueness as humans) and manis (due to cruelty that was commonplace in taming at the time). However, around thirty years before the beginning of *The Dhavas*, the West Cities became the ninth region to join the MTA, under the condition that mani taming would only be legal within the territory of its capital city, Clearport City. Thus, the region's entire mani-taming scene, including its entire MTA circuit, is located within just the one city. In the rest of the region, manis are banned from visiting human settlements unless in cases of emergency, and humans are not allowed to own, or interact with manis except in cases of emergency. In practice, as most of the region's human population is along the coast, manis generally stay in the inland areas of the region.