Where are the Au Ra?

[SannaR]

Koji also said they can't put everyone who is living there in the area we have access and that yes it doesn't reflect the numbers that are said to be in certain places. There's like two gray skined Raen watchmen/guards in the Ruby Sea if you exit into it from Kugane.

[ObsidianFire]

If you look in the lore book, it goes into who runs Kugane and most of them are Raen. However, they never show up in game because they are all in the Kugane palace where we can't go. Raen are the people who came up with the culture in the East post-Allag, but they are not the most numerous race there. In the cutscene in the Thousand Year Pine in the HoH storyline. We see both a Hyur and a Raen during the time right after Allag mention Princess Salina (probably another Hyur) and Desch (a mito'te). So we potentially have at least three races in Othard and the East right after Allag fell.

Raen are ten percent of the Eastern population. That's the same percentage of a population that Duskwights and Moonkeepers are supposed to be in Gridana. So we should see about as many Raen as we do Duskwights and Moonkeepers. Which... I kinda think we do? At least the Duskwights and Moonkeepers which are relevant in plots/quests anyway. As much as I wish we could see more Raen, I think that we see enough of them compared to other low-population races.

[Ceridwenae]

Edited in case some of this is spoilers.

I have two Raen in my adventurer squadron and know you can have more, as well as Xaela. You can pretty much come up with any story you like for the reasons they're there (beyond the generic standard given). There's a Raen involved with mining quests in Idyllshire. Kurenai's Custom Deliveries will open some information on Sui-no-Sato, but I won't spoil further in case some of you haven't done that yet. Suffice it to say, I would expect more Raen to emerge over time.

There is a Raen based in Namai for a carpentry commission in CRP 60-70.

There are Xaela involved in another set of Custom Deliveries, and some are indeed involved in the Doman Restoration. Xaela will also be part of the Namazu beast tribe quests, but as they take place on the Azim Steppe, that's an obvious one. And I'm sure no one's forgotten Sidurgu, lurking in Ishgard (unless he moves after you do DRK stuff. I haven't really done DRK stuff).

[Limonia]

According to the second lore book, the Raen population in Hingashi should be 10%, while Roegadyn are 15% and Hyur 50%. We see a lot more Roegadyn in Kugane though.
Maybe the Raen are all in other regions of Hingashi. The Kugane Magistrate seems to be a Raen, and there is Yuki from the Ninja questline, who is a princess of her clan (which isn't from Kugane though, but from some other Hingan region). So maybe some of the Raen are rich and don't just walk around in a port town? There seem to be some with the Geomancers, Onishishu, and so on.
Also, in the benchmark there are almost as many Raen in Kugane as there are Hyur.

What I find weird is that Doma should have 10% Raen too but you see almost none in Yanxia and not a single one in the Enclave. Yugiri isn't even Doman herself. There is one Raen in Namai, then a few in the fox fate chain (the fox girl, the two children where you activate the FATE and some of the enemies I think), and I found one at the House of the Fierce.

So the Raen of Doma seem to be 99% isolated from the rest. I wonder what happened to them that all of the Domans that fled together with Yugiri to Eorzea were Hyur. No Raen, no Roegadyn, no Lupin. Granted, the Lupin didn't exist in the game back then and Yugiri was the only Au Ra. But what of the Roegadyn? Too big for the boats...? But whatever, this is about Au Ra.
Even if the Raen are very seclusive, it just seems so strange that there are almost none in Doma. Especially in a time like this there would be some of them around. If some of them went to the Ruby Sea (some of them are probably originally from Hingashi and Doma, not only from Sui-no-Sato), you would think that there would be some in Doma as well.

[Jaywalker]

Even if the Raen are very seclusive, it just seems so strange that there are almost none in Doma. Especially in a time like this there would be some of them around. If some of them went to the Ruby Sea (some of them are probably originally from Hingashi and Doma, not only from Sui-no-Sato), you would think that there would be some in Doma as well.

I do remember there being some Raen in the Confederacy I think? Still beyond weird there's so few in Doma.

[Limonia]

I do remember there being some Raen in the Confederacy I think? Still beyond weird there's so few in Doma.

Yes, there are even more there than in Kugane I think. Or at least about the same.
That is why I find it so weird that there are almost none in Doma. So if they leave their home they rather go to the Ruby Sea and become part of the Confederacy than live somewhere in Doma?
I don't think all Raen confederates are from Hingashi and Sui-no-Sato, because there are many Domans among the Confederates.

[myahele]

I was really surprised by the lack of Raen in Yanxi/Doma. I don't think there were any Raen that Garleans conscripted; I didn't see a single Raen in the prisoner exchange, nor did we fight conscripted Raen.

There was only one Raen ninja in Asahi's flashback when he was surrounded by the Doman liberation.

Sometime in ARR, I remember Higiri saying that Yugiri's people have suffered greatly in Garlemald's occupation. Assuming she meant the Raen, then I guess I can see why after 20+ years there won't be that many Raen left in Yanxia since they they either fled to safer areas like Hingashi, the Confederacy or isolated settlements in Yanxia. The few that remained died in the rebellion.

[Limonia]

Sometime in ARR, I remember Higiri saying that Yugiri's people have suffered greatly in Garlemald's occupation. Assuming she meant the Raen, then I guess I can see why after 20+ years there won't be that many Raen left in Yanxia since they they either fled to safer areas like Hingashi, the Confederacy or isolated settlements in Yanxia. The few that remained died in the rebellion.

I just thought that back then the writers didn't know they would make Yugiri come from a little underwater village outside of Doma. It seems like it wasn't planned like that from the beginning. Because in the end, Yugiri didn't even have anything to do with any Raen from Doma, and Sui-no-Sato never got attacked by the Garleans.

But maybe she meant the Raen in general.
Why would the Raen suffer more from the Garlean occupation than the Hyur, Roegadyn and Lupin though? The Doman Raen usually live in various secluded mountain villages or so and have the Doman traditions. It would make more sense if the other races of Doma suffered more from the Garleans.

[ObsidianFire]

Yugiri's people would be the people of Doma. As in... the people she left her home town to live with. And they did suffer greatly in the Garlean invasion. The Doman ninjas were betrayed from within. Many of the Domans (including Gosetsu and most of the Lupin) were conscripted into the Garlean Legions. And the ones that were left in Doma were basically a the theme-park version of their culture for tourists. And then Yotsuyu came along... We see at least one empty manor house (the one the Namazu are in) on the shore of the One River and I kinda wonder if that was where there were a lot of Raen before the invasion.

The other thing to consider is that we don't see that much of Doma either. We see their capital and the delta of the One River surrounding it. We see very, very, little of the mountainous regions of it. So who knows what villages just decided there wasn't any reason to making contact when the Garleans were there and tried staying out of their way.

Something else I just thought of is that Doma has been ruled by a hyur as long as there has been a Doma. And he gained power by conquering the land on one side of the One River. Given how his decedents are described as ruling though, I can see them leaving villages and communities that didn't bother them alone. If the Rean wanted to be left alone in Yanxia, I can see the Hyur and Roegadyn doing so. Over the course of the game, both of those cultures have been presented as not being isolationist.

[Hazmick]

I've always just assumed that the Raen are all hiding in their mountain villages, like how Duskwight Elezen are mostly living in caves and whatnot which is why we rarely see them.

As others have also said, we don't see the entirety of the regions we visit - we see the immediate Doma area of Yanxia but there could be miles and miles of mountainous regions that we can't access. It's likely that many Raen have just been avoiding certain areas due to the Garlean presence.