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Overview
Colonies are the surviving human settlements in Beast of Reincarnation, scattered across the game's post-apocalyptic Japan in the year 4026. These are the last pockets of human civilisation, isolated communities that have endured two millennia of Blight corruption by walling themselves off from the outside world. The game frames the colonies as the final refuges of human life, a fragile network of survivors holding the line against Malefacts and the wider corrupted wilderness.
Function in the World
Colonies serve as the human counterweight to the Blighted Forests and Nushi territories that dominate the wider map. Within their walls, day-to-day life continues at a small scale: trade, farming, family life, and local governance. Outside their walls, the The Blight controls the ground, and travel between colonies is dangerous enough that most residents never attempt it.
The settlements are isolated by design and by necessity. Each colony has developed its own customs, its own response to the Blight, and its own relationship with whatever sealing or warding traditions kept it alive through the centuries. Pre-release material has hinted at variation between colonies in how they treat people who carry Blight signs, with some communities tolerant and others openly hostile.
Colony Profile Across the Network
Trait | Detail |
|---|---|
Size | Small. Pre-release material consistently presents colonies as villages and minor towns rather than cities. The Capital is the only settlement framed at city scale. |
Defence | Walled. Each colony is hardened against direct The Blight pressure rather than against a rival settlement. |
Economy | Local. Trade happens inside the walls; Amber handles the currency layer at colony vendors. |
Governance | Independent. Pre-release framing positions each colony as locally governed, with some loose orbit around the Capital rather than a tight political union. |
Attitude toward Blight signs | Varies. Some colonies are described as tolerant, others as openly hostile to anyone carrying visible signs of Blight corruption. |
Emma's Exile
Emma's status as a sealer is the reason she begins the game outside any colony. Her ability to hunt and seal Blight back into corrupted creatures requires that the Blight already lives inside her own body, and the visible plant-vine signs that mark her as a sealer also mark her as something colony residents fear. Pre-release material confirms that Emma was exiled from a colony because of those Blight powers, and the journey toward the Capital is in part a journey to find a place where her gift is treated as a weapon against the Blight rather than as a sign of corruption.
This exile framing keeps the player on the road for most of the campaign. Emma and Koo pass through wilderness, Blighted Forests, and the spaces between settlements far more often than they shelter inside a colony's walls. When a colony does appear, it functions as a hub: a place to talk to NPCs, restock, take stock of the journey, and confront the gap between how Emma sees herself and how colony residents see her.
Relationship to the Capital
The Capital is the largest and most fortified human settlement that the game references in pre-release material, and it is the in-fiction destination of Emma and Koo's journey. Pre-release framing positions other colonies as way-points en route, smaller communities along the eastern countryside that Emma must pass through before reaching the Capital itself. The Capital is where Emma's mission to find and defeat the Beast of Reincarnation comes to a head.
How colonies relate to the Capital politically has not been fully disclosed. The Capital is described as a centralised seat of power, with the smaller colonies operating in some loose orbit around it; the precise structure of governance, defence, and supply lines between the Capital and the colonies will be clarified by the game's release.
What the Player Encounters
Trade and resupply. NPCs who handle Amber transactions, weapon repair, and consumable restocks.
Story conversations. Story-critical dialogue that establishes how a particular colony has reacted to the Blight and to Emma's appearance.
Side characters and side tasks. Recurring NPCs who may travel with the player or send Emma on regional tasks tied to local Blight problems.
Quiet beats. Pacing breaks between Blighted Forest delves, where the camera and music slow down before the next wilderness leg.
Cultural variation. Customs, building styles, and attitudes toward sealers shift colony to colony, reinforcing the larger world's fragmentation.
Open Questions
The full list of colonies, their geographic spread across Japan, and the specifics of how each one survived the centuries of Blight pressure have not been disclosed in pre-release material. This article will be updated once the game's launch reveals the verifiable colony list and the named NPCs tied to each settlement.