Options for using magic and the races that style is associate with:
- Recite a specific phrase: Demons, humans, orcs
- Reciting a phrase but musically: elves, fairies, angels
- Perform a choreographed dance or motion: Orcs, angels
- Good ol' potions: Everyone tbh
- Blood sacrifice: Demons, orcs
- The stars must be in alignment: Dragons, angels, demons
- Classical alchemy: Dwarves, dragons
- Enchanting an item: Dwarves, humans
- Will that motherfucker into existence:
- Pray to a deity or spirit and ask them to smite a bitch for you: angels, humans
- Ghost bullshit: demons
Now, that list is not the end-all, be-all, but I think it's enough to start with. The general idea is that there's many ways to use magic, and the method that will be most common in a given culture correlates with the primary god of that culture and the philosophical values.
For examples, demons are similar to some east asian cultures, they value their ancestors and have family registries to keep track of who's who. Most demons follow Helminth because he's a god of death - you have to ask his help in order to commune with the ghosts of your ancestors.
Another example - fairies and elves are both strong followers of Eupelia. Their lifestyles both happen to depend strongly on the changing of the seasons - the fairies have to know when to burrow away for the winter lest they freeze to death, and the elves are mainly nomads who follow animal migration patterns.
Elves use songs to cast spells, because they already were using music and oral tradition for their history (you can't carry a library on horseback).
Fairies are not usually nomadic like elves, but they also use music in their magic - I took the idea of ants and bees and crickets and applied it here, so fairies have turned into "those people who use marching bands and choirs and other large ensembles to do group prayer-type spells".
... So in hindsight I guess fairies are gospel singers and big band performers.
