1700s to 1900s

You figure if you are going to learn about the history of this world you might as well start as far back as you can. Prehistory is unlikely to offer much in the way of answers so instead you head upstairs to the section marked 1700s to 1900s.

As you walk inside you are taken by just how similar it all is to what you would expect to find back home. From even a cursory glance over the displays and standees you can see that the history of this world is much the same as your own. There are displays talking about the advent of the Steam Engine and the other advances that lead to the Industrial Revolution.

However as you walk among the displays, the layout taking you ever closer to the 1900s, you start to notice slight changes. The images of early factories have more women in them than you have seen before and a few of the names you had expected to see are not present. You stop and read closer in to things as you go and the answers start to come to you.

A display showing the workforce of a 18th century wool mill offers the best insight yet. It talk at length about how the workforce you can see, that is made mostly of women, is the first image we have that shows the effects of the decline. A box out helpfully explains that “The Decline” refers to the trend towards fewer and fewer male children being born with successive generations.

Apparently the trend was first noticed around the mid 17th century but only as a mild curiosity where certain areas would have a disproportionate number of female children being born. However the trend began to speed up for reasons that are still unexplained, although the prevailing theory has it that there is some kind of mechanism that is causing male embryos to be non viable at a higher rate than females.

You keep going along the displays, searching for anymore information on why the changes in society took place. The only clue you get is a cryptically worded display at the end of the room that talks about “the stage being set for the radical change that was needed to save humanity.”