Let me take a crack.
Points of light and dark in a morass of grey.
The great and powerful monsters are dead. The external threats have been extinguished. The Empires have taken everything and there is now little if any new horizons remain to be discovered save for what's been hidden again. The common folk toil in something approaching comfort and happiness as far as they're allowed to consider while the aristocracy have grown complacent and bored, using skilled folk as game pieces against their friends and foes alike, or finding other distractions like tournaments and contests; bets to circle the world or reach long forbidden spaces.
Moments of excitement and genuine passion are rare and precious... and that is the impetuous of what comes next. The stakes have become stale for the nobles and even the gods playing their games. Death is a meaningless frivolity; and endless passage of faceless victims. So why not examine and put at risk something more precious than life?
And so were born Companion Games; elaborate, sometimes world-spanning competitions designed to be undertaken by boon-mates; friends, lovers, siblings, parents, beast tamers, etc with the express intent to put those bonds to the test. This has caused a slew of new techniques and magics to come into being to strengthen, enhance or utilize these bonds, which has spilled over into the world outside the Games.
