The mountains fall from the Crystal Sea, steeply to Partia to the south, and in gentler folds towards the Murex Sea to the rise-ward. Between, the 12 12 Vales look out over the vast swamp of the Drowned Empire.
This is a region with an ancient history of volcanism; it is underlain by a network of "Veins of Uldracht," the rivers of molten stone that are the blood of the Great Earth-Mother-Beast that is the world. The lines defined by these veins, and especially where they intersect or pool in underground molten-stone lakes, sponsor volcanoes above. These volcanoes often also mark the intersection of Veins and Lay-lines, or points of transmutation of power from one form to another.
Volcanoes may slumber, cold and still, for millennia between eruptions. Others, commonly called "bleeders," ooze molten stone regularly, even constantly. "Dusters" chuff out aerial rivers of ash, which may drift like dry snow upon the lands downwind or sponsor permanent cloudbanks of aerial-plankton. "Smokers" and "steamers" are self-explanatory. Another effect of this geological underpinning is that pools, streams, and rivers vary widely, from the icy cold some foreigners seem to expect through tepid to boiling, and may be as much mud as water. Great eruptions have occurred regularly here. One characteristic is that a layer of ash or smoke-powder will fall in a smothering blanket of irregular thickness, but often of a dozen or more arm-spans in depth, which is then crusted over by an equal thickness of molten material that cools to granite or basalt. Over time, the ash or powder may be dissolved and run out from between the layers, or become gummy and compacted in the narrower areas. The result is a land formed of layers of hard stone with layers of open spaces in-between. Where the weight above exceeds the strength of the hard stone, a layer will split and settle, creating great cracks and chasms that connect the layers vertically.
Complicating this volcanically based geology are a variety of biotic contributions, most notably that of corals. Corals build up layers which may become limestone, chalk, or marble, pure or riddled with aggregate as puddingstone or rottenstone where mud and minerals seep in to fill the polyp cavities before compression, heat, and chemistry transform it. Land-corals are just as diverse as sea-corals. Colonies grow in a wide variety of shapes, generally designed to maximize the colony's surface area while protecting it from harm; some colonies mimic trees or thickets in form, others build wall-like reefs in natural labyrinths. (See Land-corals under habitats or flora and fauna.) In addition to land and sea corals, aerial coral islands may rain more lime or calciferous material down from the sky, or crash more or less intact. All this means that seams of such materials often lay between the layers of volcanic stone.
The rich layer of biologic matter growing upon the surface and smothered by the eruption also becomes incorporated into the geology. Rich soil, seared and compressed, may form seams peat or coal. It is not rare for whole forests to be preserved as casts; the ash drifts down and presses about them, then the molten stone comes and burns the wood away, flowing down into the space formerly occupied by the wood and restrained in its shape by the surrounding compacted ash. The process is much like bronze casting, wherein a wax mold is covered in clay and then liquid bronze flows in and replaces the wax. Perhaps most intriguing are the ruins in the layers. Successive civilizations go back so far here that they are seen as a natural part of the geologic layers. As with the trees cast in stone, so too are ancient cities and other structures preserved by insulating cloaks of ash and wrapped in stone.
TERRAIN
The terrain here is generally rugged but varied. The peaks are generally steep sided craters, as the volcanoes' throats are lined with obsidian or other hard, weathering-resistant stone. The great crater of a large mountain may be a dozen leagues across, while a side vent may form only a miniature hill no taller than a person. A crater may have blown violently, or sucked back after blowing, and so leave a steep funnel within. Just as likely, is may have choked itself slowly, and its rim bound a smooth, possibly sunken, plateau. Whether the crater contains a lake or is dry depends upon drainage, commonly by a waterfall cutting through the crater rim-wall or by underground outlets.
Likewise, whether two peaks are separated by a flat bottomed valley, rich of soil, or by a narrow cleft depends on whether the water on their flanks trickles down to settle its sediments out or rushes down, carving ever deeper. Generally, the heaviest erosion occurs below the peak, sculpting sharp-winged shoulders and narrow clefts, while lower pocked are rich flat land, the water pooling before rushing out a deep-carven, narrow exit. Streams and rivers disappear underground just as frequently as they erupt full-grown from caves. This is a land of spectacular waterfalls; stretches of navigable river are rare.
CLIMATE
Lush and wet are the dominant tones here. Sea-fog drifts in heavy from the ocean, while steam-vents, geysers, and steaming ponds support permanent cloud-drifts. . Smoke drifting from volcanic peaks also sponsors permanent banks of aerial plankton, which drip a constant patter of mist.
Weather
Gentle fluctuations from sun to haze, from mist to rain and sun, are punctuated by fierce storms, even blizzards. In most places the snow disappears quickly. Only near the Glassiurs does it last for a season or longer. There is no record of drought.
Habitats
The general clime is temperate, but a quarter of the land is not. Glassiurs chill some areas, and sponsor tiny slips of cold temperate and alpine or arctic clime about their skirts, while heat from below, either directly or in drifts of steam, may bring some valleys up to full tropical clime.
THE PEOPLE
MAJOR INTELLIGENT RACES
There is no majority here. Mannish folk are the most common minority; some estimates place them as a full 20% of the total population, but that depends on who are being considered folk. Humans are distinct in being organized. Only the Elvyn and Dwarvyn volk are - at least in large part - better organized, but the Elvyn number far fewer now, and the Dwarvyn are generally more properly considered a volk of the Lands Below, and are rarely true surface volk.
Only the Goblyn come close to rivaling Mannish numbers. Thankfully, they are generally of a very low order of organization.
MINOR INTELLIGENT RACES
Would it be easier to list what races aren't represented here? Most are found only in small, often half savage village tribes or clans. Badger and Bear, Wolfyn and Otter, Mole and Frog, Orc and wild Kobald, Gnome and Ogre, Obbit and (Marsh) Wiggle, Lizard-man and shy Sasquach ape volk, Poddlings and Monopods, alien-minded Arachnid and slow-living Ent, each in their several kinds, they all have their home territories and disputes. Other races are thought less common, but rumor has it there are even Ophidian serpent volk and Aspis Mantid insectoid settlements hidden in the wood-shrouded vales.
SETTLEMENT PATTERNS
There are no cities in the mountains, and precious few large towns. Most folk live in isolated farmsteads, thorps, or small villages, often clustered under a keep or small castle. Much of the land has no civilized inhabitants at all. Settlements tend to be racially mixed; a sort of caste system is developing, whereby each race contributes what it is best at.
CULTURE
Basically idealized Golden Age of Chivalry in a fabulous but often dark and wild wood. Civilizing influences are Renaissance Italian from Gryphandor and Mesopotamian/Persian from Partia, with stronger, although less civilized influence from Mongol, Nord, and Slav tribes. There is even some Classical influence rising from the Rainbow Sea.
Upper class or "modern" architecture is primarily Gothic, especially as the use of slate-tree stone timber can facilitate a virticle look. There is also a Renaisance Italian or French overlay. Old-stle architecture is more Celtic in the low lands. The mountains, of course, have heavy Nord and Slav architectural influences, again sometimes with a Renaisance overlay.
Histories
The Daemondym peppered the whole known world with their settlement, now ruins or at least overgrown and best forgotten. During the First Age after the Daemonds left, the mountains were being brought into civilization, by Partia and Aquillonia, when the Chaos came and Dark swept the land. Some say the Daemondym were attempting a comeback. Today civilization is rising again, and is just beginning to penetrate into the mountains beyond the main trade routs to the Crystal Sea.
Economy
The main trade routs are up from the Murex Sea and Partia and across the Crystal Sea, but there are lesser routs traveling horizontally about the mountains. What little navigable waters there are tend to wrap around the ranges. There is likely as much trade passing between the surface volkyn and the Deeps as there is among the "Sun-Dwellers."