Astrum vs Westgard never happened. Westgard got scared and backed out when Hemmings chickened out by pausing. (might have deleted not sure)
Westgard's new ruler (who is the current ruler now) decide to apologize and normalize the situation. Dragomir accepted and moved on.
It was simple really. Unlike now, monsters were being funneled into Westgard so they really couldn't afford to fight Astrum. Hemmings was just stupid to think he could take on Astrum.
Realms started to survive more wars as the player base shrunk. People could no longer afford to set up colonies to replace existing realms. With the game stuck at 400 players, I doubt people want to destroy any realm but they probably still want to take at least a city or few regions.