It sounds very much to me that your setting has become an important character in your story. It may even become the centerpiece of your theme. And as such is an important element to your plot (if nothing else it has become something that motivates your protagonist).

But... don't become enslaved by the details while writing your first draft. It's not cheating to use a "marker" of some kind that you can search for later to add to your list of "things you need answers for" (I use "xxx" as in "He knew komi for the Chinese games was xxx" and "komi" is a real word used by Go pros but that's another story ;-) Yeah, I know that "xxx" will be counted as a word but I also know that it's something that I'll be adding later (as opposed to writing something like "xxxx xxx and xxx").

So keep writing! Make notes for yourself to be added to your next draft. The important thing is to get the story down on paper so-to-speak and sweat the details later!