Shivers (/ʃɪv.ərz/)

Sometimes, the world shakes. As Little Circle and Circle connected together, land rose from beneath the water and reached up toward the sky. The echoes of The Kiss still shudder the world on occasion, causing land to rise or fall back into the ocean.

from the ground up

Shivers start as isolated points on the ocean floor collapsing. The collapses trigger rings of nearby stone to ripple forward and then up or down depending on the existing placement of the rock.
Shivers affect the whole world, but are often contained locally to specific parts of the Circle and Little Circle archipelagos. Shivers run in concentric circles from their point of origin and can raise or lower land nearby. At most, they will make or sink small islands, but the Circles themselves are maintained. What comes up must go down eventually, so islands that pop in and out of existence due to shivers are called Shiver Islands.

shiver spikes

An uptick in local shivers can be troublesome for reef-dwellers. Reefs and sponges have been known to collapse if there are too many shivers in a short period of time, episodes known as shakes or quakes. For amphibious creatures, shakes are an exciting time, as the waves can be used to surf along or even over the coasts. For deep-sea dwellers, shivers often go unnoticed unless new ground swells up and pushes their homes too close to the surface for their comfort.