The second world is a medium-magic setting. Deserts, sand storms, cities made of blown glass or huddled around mountain peaks. The second city is nestled in the storm-shadow of a mountain range, protecting it for half the year from the sand storms that blow continually from one pole to the other. It is a Tier 2 world, with steady mana flow and low morphogenic consistency. Magical creatures do fine here, and technological constructs only find themselves changed with prolonged intense temperature fluctuations.
The second world is a moon orbiting a gas giant with massive rings. The two are tidally locked, so the planet takes up roughly a quarter of Spire's sky at all times. The planet's axis (and thus the moon's orbit) is tilted almost 90 degrees. Due to this atypical orbit pattern, the second city experiences unique seasons. During two long seasons, the sun hangs in perpetual twilight. It spins around the horizon, never quite facing Spire directly. During the other two seasons, more direct day/night cycles occur, as well as frequent (practically nightly) planetary eclipses. During the two twilight seasons, strong winds blow from one pole to the other. In the summer months, the mountains shield these winds. In the winter months, the winds come from the unblocked pole and it takes constant work by Orcish engineers to keep their large glass windbreaks in operating condition to shield Spire from the sands. During the off-seasons, as the winds gradually slow and shift direction, the desert stills. It's a popular activity for Spire residents to picnic out on the sands, admiring the stunning celestial views.
The only sapient locals are the orcs, who operate as a series of kingdoms dividing the habitable twilight zone of the moon's equator. The orcish kingdom in which Spire sits has grown wealthy with trade and off-world innovation, and has been aggressively funding research programs to explore the possibility of terraforming and making habitable the more extreme environments of the poles (which are cast into perpetual day and night respectively throughout Spire's twilight seasons). The king technically holds the orcish chair on the Spire parlament, though more often than not xyr heir attends the actual meetings in xyr stead.
The local biomes are generally hot and dry. The deserts are home to countless small animals and sturdy plants which bloom during the still seasons, but during the windy seasons are covered by shifting sand. The mountains behind Spire are tall and craggy, with many deep crevices that shelter the planet's lifeforms from the winds. The caves and ravines of this mountain range are home to most of the kingdom's population including the capital city, though some orcs do make their home within the desert itself.
Orcs are a reptilian species, typically between 4' and 8' tall, with long thick tails and scaly skin. Due to their high body temperatures they'll often form scale-like growths of glass on their skin as stray sand particles hit them. Orcs have intense monogamous relationships and tend to retain close ties with only their closest family members. They lay eggs, typically in small clutches of 1-3, which are cared for by the immediate family until they're ready to hatch. Most orcs, then, are twins or triplets, and these sibling relationships are highly prioritized. Like many reptiles, the sex of the children is determined by the incubation temperature- cool eggs will hatch into males and hot eggs into females. Unlike other reptiles, orcish sex remains malleable and temperature sensitive after birth. Orcish genders are clearly delineated into a 4-part matrix, intimately tied to their innate magic and biological sex. Changing sex/gender is a common and unremarkable occurrence, but deviation outside the clearly delineated quadrants and gendered behavioral norms is frowned upon heavily.
To understand orcish gender, we must understand orcish magic. Orcs are able to freely transform magic into heat and vice versa, making them effectively immune to the dangers of iron contact for most magical beings. They say that the sun fills the dragonfire vessel within them- for the sun is the most readily available heat and mana source, and their internal mana reserves are indeed capped. It is difficult, but certainly not impossible, to burn an orc. Mana can then be spent in one of two ways, aligning with the two primary sexes. First, it can be funneled into the orc's body, heating and strengthening it. The orc's body reacts by growing larger, stronger, and more durable. This gendered experience is best translated as "warriors." Warriors are found in primarily physical professions, roles with a lot of manual labor or durability required. They average around 7' tall and are bulky and muscular, as well as being the egg-producing sex.
Second, mana can be directed outside of the body. In this case the orc becomes smaller, flexible but slow and weak. They average around 5' tall and are the sperm-producing sex. This gendered experience is best translated as "mage." Mages can channel their fire in a wide variety of shapes and patterns depending on the skill level. The most obvious application is sand-blowing: a skilled mage can send heat into the sand and pull out a glass structure matching almost any desired shape. They can also infuse mana directly into glass, stones, or gemstones, creating powerful mana batteries that are accessible by many of Spire's magical systems. Mages are found in a number of professions including fabrication, medicine, culinary arts, and service industries. Other career paths exist and are typically less gendered, though it's still expected for an orc to physically and socially conform to one of the established gendered presentations.
The other two genders are rarer. As orc gender is deeply intertwined with their careers and daily use of their powers, there's a strong class component to gender expression. Most orcs find the need to expend their mana over the course of their daily lives in order to perform their duties and sustain themselves. An orc who's affluent enough to hoard their mana without spending it, keeping their cup full, can become the third gender. This is typically translated as "serpent" today, though "priest" and "cultivator" have been common translations for the role at different points. Serpents have the height of a warrior with the lanky frame of a mage. They are infertile, though they can transition to one of the base genders quickly if they choose to expend their mana. Their senses are heightened, and their movements quick and fluid. By keeping their dragonfire vessel full, they're able to slowly expand their capacity for holding mana. Though they're typically reluctant to use their reserves of power, its mere presence is a powerful threat and warning. Serpents occupy the religious upper echelons of Orc society and hold many roles within bureaucratic and academic circles. The current king, as well as xyr heir, are both of the serpent form.
Finally, the fourth orcish gender is the class-inversion of the serpent. If serpents represent wealth and prestige through the hoarding of power, then this form represents destitution and disgrace through their utter lack of internal warmth. When an orc has to expend their entire reserves completely and repeatedly, only able to gather enough warmth to sustain their own body, they are known as "chilled." An important note on orcish biology- like all reptiles, orcs are cold blooded. In order to function with their physical size and activity level, they use their mana to imitate a warm blooded biology. The chilled are the orcs who can barely sustain themselves this way, and have no power left for strengthening their bodies or growing larger. They average around 4', scrawny, weak, and slow. Their scales grow dull. At best, they are pitied. There are no occupations that tend to produce chilled orcs by the necessity of their work, and little room is made for them in society. Interestingly, prolonged time spent as a chilled will leave an orc with an increased refill rate for their dragonfire vessel. Ex-chilled are typically able to absorb heat faster and are able to transition more quickly between the other forms once they have access to enough of a heat source to do so.
Historical and mythological sources reference a fifth form, the dragon. The last dragon was seen roughly 200 years ago and was part of the joining of the 5 worlds. Massive creatures with fiery breath,leathery wings, and a limited ability to shapeshift and take on the features of the lesser forms. The mechanisms by which an orc becomes a dragon have been lost to time, and are highly sought after. The current king claims to be a direct descendant of this last known dragon.
Orc religion revolves around a celestial pantheon, headed by their solar deity. She is the source of all heat, all magic, and all life. Secondary deities represent the ringed planet, the planet's other moons, and the distant stars. Some more minor attention is paid to the land itself, but most of their religious attention is directed upwards. Small shrines are common in most homes, and each orcish settlement has at least one larger temple, a flat space open to the sky above with a fire kept burning at the center. Prayers are made in the form of burnt offerings. Major holidays fall around the turning of the seasons, birth and death dates of major historical figures, and the most total eclipse of each season.
Orcs are obligate carnivores, though their caloric requirements go down significantly if they're able to absorb enough heat. The orcish kingdom in which Spire is situated boasts many large farms, cultivating large herds of herbivore livestock within the canyons of the nearby mountains. Beyond that it has relatively little in the way of agriculture and imports much of their staple crops from other nearby kingdoms, in trade for off-world delicacies.
Orcs are generally considered emotional, fickle, creative, and loyal. They make excellent friends and terrifying enemies.