While Baylands city-state could be described as a large nation, the districts within —apart from the five districts of Baylands City— were somewhat of states within this nation. Alleva district was a 'state' with many cities and large towns within it. In turn, these cities and large towns had little towns or villages surrounding them.
Garena town, for instance, was surrounded by a few small towns and villages. Some of them were caught in the attack, while the others were emptied of their citizens, who managed to flee before the process.
Southvale Village was an example of the former.
Being slightly far away from Garena town, Southvale village was one of the lowest-ranked villages in the area. Its population wasn't large, and the only way the village held onto its economy was that it was a large producer of a specific type of grain.
[1] This is different from the blockade that Lucas faced before entering. The latter was prevent people from coming into the region and was much further away from Garena town. As for the former, it was closer to the town and was set up to monitor the desolate beasts and prevent them from leaving Garena town and the surrounding 2km.