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The Cad. Often misinterpreted as the 'C.A.D.' -- 'Cad' is actually an abbreviation, not an acronym. Though many currently think it stands for 'carry and deliver,' the mana-based metro system was actually originally coined Cadueces, after the staff of Hermes. Of course, the serpentine symbol on the front of the train has faded after years of use, and the more colloquial 'Cad' came into fashion. Eventually, this turned into people trying to remember why it was called the Cad in the first place, and thus the overly simple 'Carry-and-deliver' acronym. But that's not the interesting part of this story.[break][break]


Created a hundred or so years before the beginning of the Great War, the Cad was the ultimate representation of peace for all of witch kind. The project was started by Selene Fresnov, a public Hydra sympathizer and controversial if high-ranking Cerberus witch in her own right. She was an advocate of 'Magical Engineering' -- a kind of crude take on Enchantment not enjoyed by her contemporaries, but whose benefits we enjoy today. Anyway, this story isn't about Fresnov and her controversies, either.

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It's about the team that Fresnov created: Hydra witches, Cerberus witches. Working together on something that could change the world as they knew it. Of course, the peace project was nipped in the bud before it could even begin -- whether the annulment was on Hydra's side or the Wolves is anyone's guess, and the truth of the fallout remains buried to this day. (Even after the fallout, Fresnov worked on the train with her own group, excluding Hydra, and finished the project). [break][break]The popular opinion is of tragedy: unfortunately, the ideals of the covens could not see eye to eye, and while Hydra wanted the mana realm portals to be used for much more ambitious goals, Cerberus could not abide by their darker dreams.[break][break]

Of course, Hydra will tell you a different story: one that begins with oppressed 'criminals' being recruited for their engineering talents by an ever-egoistic Fresnov and her tyrannical Cerberus compatriots. Oh. Didn't I say this wasn't about Fresnov? Right. The train.

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The train is a wonder to behold, and not just in terms of size. It comfortably seats small tables of four on either side of a decently spacious aisle, with room for luggage for longer trips on the overhead compartments. But it's also wonderful because it manages to bring together all kinds of sustained spellwork: from heavy-lifting Augmentation to ensure it's air-tight, to Aquos and Aer working in tandem to ventilate the air, to enchantment to ward off the unwithstandable pressures of pure energy it must overcome. Why all the safety enchantments? Right.

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The train travels through the mana realm, a realm of pure energy, where familiars are thought to reside. No other kind of magical phenomenon is known to do this, except maybe daemon raptures. But that's a story and a problem for another researcher to tackle. The exterior of the Cad must be able to, in other words, enable safety inside conditions that would probably instantly kill an exposed organism, much like Outer Space might. [break][break]The portals associated with the Cad work in the logic of almost every other magical portal, but instead of a pre-determined endpoint, they are concurrent with the map of reality. Thus, the train travels in real-time to get to its destinations while never actually existing in the physical plane until it arrives there.

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Are you following along? No? I didn't think so. It's okay, no one ever really gets it the first time.

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To simplify, the Cad is airtight, with magically regulated airflows. It travels through a realm of pure energy, which, to the visible eye when passing by it, looks like a nebula of soft, green stars. It is able to evade the physical realm, which is why it's so useful to witches and humans in Salem, who had for centuries prior to its invention been trying to trade through carriages. Which, when you're living in world like ours, well. Daemons always take advantage of of the weak.

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Its immense economic importance has made the Cad the cornerstone of a lot of politics across the continent. Which village, town, or city gets a Cad stop? How many stops does the Myca Desert have compared to Delphi? Do the inhabitants (so few as is) of the Floating Archives really deserve their own Cad stop? These stops determine the economy and freedom of movement of many individuals, especially humans who cannot ride brooms or defend themselves against daemons and the wild.