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[WillowLuman]

The Ash-sea is more dense than air, but less dense than water, causing all of the seafaring races to use artificial means in order to make their ships lighter- usually either harvesting the gas from ash-jellyfish, or flying atop swirling clouds of the damned.

The Pure Air of the Trees is a valuable resource, not only for those who try to fill their enclosed dwellings with it for health, but also for ballast on the ash-ships of the non-elven races, the air being far less dense than the sea. Collecting it from the enclosed groves is a highly dangerous, but highly profitable occupation.

Though the world may seem grim to us, its inhabitants know nothing else, and most face it with a resolute cheer and a will to survive. To laugh in the face of danger and live is considered virtue by many, and to seek immortality through tales and song a worthy goal.

The greatest skalds dive into the ash-sea with jelly-skin suits and branches taken from the Trees, to collect stories from the Dead.

EDIT: The Songs of the End are as diverse as the creatures of the world. Philosophers and Wise Folk spend a great deal of time debating the relative truth of each, but there is little doubt amongst all that the world will indeed end.

[kaian-a-coel]

This world is METAL.

Tiny clarifications:
Ash elves (sailing the seas on bone ships) are the main elven race. They obey the Immortal King whose throne is on his mystical ship. They're the ones enslaving and stuff.

The other elves, calling themselves the "Pure Ones" (and called "the Fools" by the Ash elves) live on the island near the dwarven lands. They are the ones being sacrificed by the dwarves. They are fascinated by the pure groves of trees. They worship the trees and try to fill the world with it. The trees being carnivorous, they are regularly eaten. But the local trees mostly spare them, seeing them as cattle to be preserved.

Maggot men were driven away from the "pure" elven island by the elves, who hate them because of their alliance with the Ash elves, and see them as corrupters of the groves. Being travelers by nature,  the maggotmen didn't really mind.

Pure Elves and their grove-covered island are a great source of valuable purified air, and thus is regularly raided by their ashen cousins.

"one year" equate "one tide". The tides are really slow.

The Akupara religion in fact believe that the world is carried in the creature's mouth (and not on its back), like a pearl or an egg. Some people still cling to the outdatted belief that the world is bowl-shapped and carried on the back of the creature, but are generally seen as nuts and fools, for the world is indeed spherical and would probably roll away if carried on the creature's back.

[WillowLuman]

Through processes not yet understood by even the most adventurous alchemists, from the Ash at the bottom of the ocean coalesces a shallow "under-sea" of water, which upwells as springs throughout the islands, which occasionally form rivers that fall again into the ashen sea and back to the bottom. Thus water becomes available so dwarves, elves, and trees may live.

Some believe that the Dead find their way to the under-sea on occasion, dodging the great Eaters of the Deep, and make their way under the Lands and up to the springs of the surface, whereupon they might begin life anew. But only some believe this.

[Urist Mc Dwarf]

There is one island, far away from basically everything, where a dozen creatures sleep. These are the Dragaii, and when they wake, blood shall rain. They will fly into the sun and burn, and their ash is blood. As is everything else about them. Except their teeth. These teeth will further rain down, and where they fall. A Gretree will rise. Gretrees are immune to all the ravages of the world, and under their shelter, many things grow and thrive.

[highmax28]

There is one island, far away from basically everything, where a dozen creatures sleep. These are the Dragaii, and when they wake, blood shall rain. They will fly into the sun and burn, and their ash is blood. As is everything else about them. Except their teeth. These teeth will further rain down, and where they fall. A Gretree will rise. Gretrees are immune to all the ravages of the world, and under their shelter, many things grow and thrive.

There is only one Gretree thus far, and it is was found to be under the ash sea but rose high enough that its top is a landmass. Many have tried to go under, but it is thick, and to go under the Gretree in the ash sea would be suicide; many sea gods use the Gretree as their home.

[LeoLeonardoIII]

The lesser trees which maggot-man camp within are roots of the Gretree that have burrowed through the ground and grown upward.

[WillowLuman]

There is one island, far away from basically everything, where a dozen creatures sleep. These are the Dragaii, and when they wake, blood shall rain. They will fly into the sun and burn, and their ash is blood. As is everything else about them. Except their teeth. These teeth will further rain down, and where they fall. A Gretree will rise. Gretrees are immune to all the ravages of the world, and under their shelter, many things grow and thrive.

There is only one Gretree thus far, and it is was found to be under the ash sea but rose high enough that its top is a landmass. Many have tried to go under, but it is thick, and to go under the Gretree in the ash sea would be suicide; many sea gods use the Gretree as their home.

It is said the oldest of the Sea-gods, who are the ancestors of the rest of them, know from whence the world came, and why and what is happening, but they speak to no-one of it, not even their progeny.

The Dragon, the great beast from whose bones the halfbreed-captain's dreaded ship is made, is also said to have known, but preferred death over telling, and so was slain and became the mast of the ship, and its keel.

[LeoLeonardoIII]

When the dead journey up through the ground via water springs, sometimes they encounter orichalcum deposits which to them glow like the sun. Believing they have found an exit, they get too close and get sucked in, merging with the vein and adding more orichalcum ore to it. Whether the ore originally fell from the sun or not, it is now mostly composed of the remnants of lost souls. It also means that the largest veins of ore are near water springs, although the path of springs can change and huge veins can be located far from any spring, and static in size because there's no new flow of fresh souls. When Cavian Dwarves (as opposed to Spiralian believers) exploring the underworld search for springs, they also frequently find good veins of orichalcum.

However, sometimes a pocket of water forms when the spring gets cut off, sometimes as large as a lake. Trapped here are the souls that are unwilling to touch the orichalcum and thus die forever. They linger on, growing quiet, until the water pocket is breached.

[Karkov]

((I kinda like how we have forsaken an afterlife for all of these souls, and we basically end up drinking them, wearing them, and using them as weapons.  Along with them yelling at us from the ocean and sometimes the clouds.  Hell, we don't have ambient cricket sounds at this point, it gets too quiet and you start hearing souls wail at you.))

[The Froggy Ninja]

((I kinda like how we have forsaken an afterlife for all of these souls, and we basically end up drinking them, wearing them, and using them as weapons.  Along with them yelling at us from the ocean and sometimes the clouds.  Hell, we don't have ambient cricket sounds at this point, it gets too quiet and you start hearing souls wail at you.))

((Don't forget riding them.))

[highmax28]

There is a sea serpent who is known to feed off of the souls of the dead. On the last days of the world, he would surface and devour the dead that died during the wars, before he would spray the lands of the maggot men with his toxic breath. He is beleived a mortal enemy of the first maggot men, for legend said he was trapped under a Gretree and devoured the roots, killing them and turning them into the islands the people of this world call home. He would be slain by a warrior maggot man who would jump in its maw, break its jaws and pierce its heart by jumping into the beasts body. The warrior would die, but the souls of the dead that the beast devoured when he surfaced would be free from all bonds and rest in peace.

[WillowLuman]

((I kinda like how we have forsaken an afterlife for all of these souls, and we basically end up drinking them, wearing them, and using them as weapons.  Along with them yelling at us from the ocean and sometimes the clouds.  Hell, we don't have ambient cricket sounds at this point, it gets too quiet and you start hearing souls wail at you.))

(Perhaps that source of the Orichalcum is but a myth of the Cavian dwarves, though. And there's also the possibility of reincarnation for those that reach the surface through one of the springs. You could also see it as a "circle of life" deal, where the souls of dead generations help nourish the current generations, thus becoming part of new life. Ambiguity in Mythopeoia is where half of the fun is )

EDIT: (Here's a fun idea; maybe Orichalcum can only be used below ground or under the sea, because the dead souls that compose it are released to live again if taken to the surface (unless perhaps the metal is treated to bind them somehow?). Not officially putting it in, though, because this idea could be problematic.)

[Karkov]

EDIT: (Here's a fun idea; maybe Orichalcum can only be used below ground or under the sea, because the dead souls that compose it are released to live again if taken to the surface (unless perhaps the metal is treated to bind them somehow?). Not officially putting it in, though, because this idea could be problematic.)

((Possibly treated with the manaroc gems that are revealed/released by the spire whenever it pulses?  It could be a binding element controlled by the dwarves, a monopoly of sorts on orichalcum goods.  Or the dwarves have some ancient power source/regenerating material/crystal thing beneath the base of the spire itself, where most of their colony thrives, and they can use it to bind the power (souls) within the Orichalcum.  When Orichalcum is powered (soul intact) it's stronger than steel, and possibly any other metal found within the islands.  Whenever it's powered off (soul escapes) it's brittle, and weaker than copper or tin.  It'd be an interesting concept if anything.))

[LeoLeonardoIII]

(I kinda intended the souls-bound-to-orichalcum thing to be hopeless and creepy. Also if you use an orichalcum sword to slash at a ghost he will take super damage because he's getting sucked in. And then you have to get your sword reforged because it's all grotesquely deformed now.)

[WillowLuman]

EDIT: (Here's a fun idea; maybe Orichalcum can only be used below ground or under the sea, because the dead souls that compose it are released to live again if taken to the surface (unless perhaps the metal is treated to bind them somehow?). Not officially putting it in, though, because this idea could be problematic.)

((Possibly treated with the manaroc gems that are revealed/released by the spire whenever it pulses?  It could be a binding element controlled by the dwarves, a monopoly of sorts on orichalcum goods.  Or the dwarves have some ancient power source/regenerating material/crystal thing beneath the base of the spire itself, where most of their colony thrives, and they can use it to bind the power (souls) within the Orichalcum.  When Orichalcum is powered (soul intact) it's stronger than steel, and possibly any other metal found within the islands.  Whenever it's powered off (soul escapes) it's brittle, and weaker than copper or tin.  It'd be an interesting concept if anything.))

(That could be the binding agent, or perhaps it must be coated in sea-ash to prevent them escaping. Maybe both methods are used, but one is more reliable? Underground and in the sea, it would retain its full strength, as the souls are not at the surface, but above it would deteriorate quickly?)

(I kinda intended the souls-bound-to-orichalcum thing to be hopeless and creepy. Also if you use an orichalcum sword to slash at a ghost he will take super damage because he's getting sucked in. And then you have to get your sword reforged because it's all grotesquely deformed now.)

(Well, if you think about it, this method means that to use the metal at surface level, people have to willingly keep the souls of the deal imprisoned. In fact, to use it undergound means to willingly prevent them from reaching the surface, so it's all a bit horrifying.)