Transportation Stations

Transportation Stations, or transport stations, are locations that utilize transportation magic to instantly send people or things from one location to another. They are located throughout Nideon, usually in large cities, and though they usually take the form of buildings, all they require is at least 100 square feet of open space and a unique symbol to identify them.

While transportation magic has been used since the ancient times by those with the natural gift, it was first harnessed as routine means of transport in Diamondheart, which later spread it to the many countries it battled and occupied. Transportation magic allows the user to magically "jump" from one place to another, but to do accurately, the transporter must have a clear picture of the location to which he is jumping. The Diamondhearten miliary would clear a space of approximately 100 square feet, where they would usually erect a pavillion or other cover, and assign a transport mage to it to move anything in the area to a similar one on a different continent. Technology like this is what helped the nation get the upper hand in areas like Florarova.

Several problems arose as new transportation stations were built. First, the transport mage manning any given station would need to have seen every other station in order to clearly picture in their mind. This became increasingly difficult as more stations were built. Furthermore, changes in weather could sometimes affect a person's image and send people and objects to the wrong locations. To fix this problem, a system was formed whereby each transport station was given a unique symbol that would identify it, and was marked permanantly at the given location. Then, a transportation mage only needed to picture the symbol to accurately trasnport someone, and each transport mage was given a guide with the symbols and which locations they represented.

Another problem created by the growing number of transport stations was that two people might attempt to transport things to the same station at the same time. But if for example, a person arrives from one transport station and a cart of food arrives from another immediately after, the person will likely to be crushed. Thus, more space was carved out, so that each station had separate incoming and outgoing platforms, and a strict schedule was developed determined which times each station could transport to another. This, of course, also led to the beginning of a standardized time system across Nefrale.