Ossuria

Ossurian Royal Oligarchic Empire

home of the Crypt Shrine of Krinykhiezne

OROE is an interesting case. The Tzaichor is believed to be a satanic bloodthirsty tyrant with his royal oligarchs merely lackeys in his unholy army, the day to day life of Ossurians being that of daily blood sacrifices and neverending frenzies of madness and intonations in blackend burnt out cathedrals. The Tzaichor is indeed a psychotic despot with a totalitarian regime and life in the capital core and major border cities are nightmarish dystopias with wailing demon-worshiping celebrants taking shifts at the manic improvised machinations of their religion's rites, indeed the peasant serfs are oppressed, but it's severity gradiates outward from them. In the backwaters, commoner life is bleak and oppressive, but quiet.

Also, the Royal Oligarchs collectively are no where near as mad as their emperor king, quite cunning in fact. They manipulate the hereditarily insane Rutelnekyscu dynasty to barbarism to make their own serfs "appreciative" of their own relative-to-Rutelnekyscu bearable brutality. It is important to remember that each Royal Oligarch is himself a king in his own right and thus as far reaching powers over their local subjects. The Tzaichor is more a useful spiritual figurehead, propaganda tool, and ruthless war commander than a true autocratic monarch.

75% of the Ossurian population live in the major cities, about half (37.5%) of them live in the Imperial cities under the direct hellish rule of the Tzaichor, the other half (37.5%) under the more sensible if cruel Grand Royal Oligarchs, the rest in the 25% live in the backwaters.

So when you break it down, only a bit over a third of Ossurians live in anywhere near close to the nightmare that Grimmorians, Estherians, and Mengshi imagine they all do. (Odranzans (besides Berjani merchants) have never even heard of it, isolationalists and all that)