The Ropemaker Versions of Reality Quotes

How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)

Quote #10

"Things were not always was you have seen them," she said. "We are taught that, long ago, before there were Emperors, there was a balance. Magic came into the world, and those who knew how could use it, and the rest flowed away south. But as the Emperors established their power they hired magicians to take control of the magic. No one foresaw that one result of their work would be that they gathered all the magic they could into themselves, so that now less of it flowed out than came in. The difference was only slight, but the balance was lost. Gradually, over the generations, the pressure has increased." (15.75)

As far as Tilja knows, the Empire has always been the way she knows it. Multiple times she muses on the seeming infinity of the generations and the interminability of the oppression. But as it turns out, the myth she has constructed for herself about the Empire she knows isn't entirely factual—at one point, the Watchers didn't exist and have a monopoly on magic, and life was likely much better for everyone. If this is true, what other notions about the Empire are false?