Transportation Systems

During the earliest eras of Astorian history

Sun Kingdom
Within the Sun Kingdom paths for walking were carved out initially by a pathmaker, who would know the quickest way from location to location. After confirmation of a route common folk would be inclined to use it, and depending on how often it was used the path would be naturally flattened.

If these paths were crowded, the local official would assign workers to widen the path. This commonly included salting it and lining the path with gravel, this both killed most plants and provided more grip in the Long Dusk season. These wider paths were later officially considered roads.

A frequent phenomena across the Sun kingdom was the great cattle crossing, where wild cattle would cross vast distances at set times of the year. This behavior still remained in partially domestic cattle, but rather than breeding it out completely cattle farmers managed to re-tune the behavior to the point where cattle would tread a set route without prompting in a specific breed of cattle.

These cattle would travel shorter distances than their wild cousins, but travel more frequently.

Dubbed cart cattle by the common folk, people would leave out water and food outside their homes if they lived by a cart cattle route so they might jump on the cart as the cattle rested. At either end of the route, stands a pen for the cow to rest and feed.

Early issues found with cart cattle were dying from exhaustion, as the cattle had a strong impulse to immediately turn to travel back once they had reached their destination. This was solved by the hiring of cow keepers at either end of the route, where they would cordon off the cows into their pen to ensure they rested, and also maintained the carts.

Earth Kingdom
Originally most villages within the Earth kingdom were built relatively close to each other, meaning that most places were within walking distance, however the mountainous regions in the north proved more difficult, especially when transporting goods or other raw materials.

In the flatter regions of the kingdom horse breeding became more popular initially due to the need for meat, however different breeds developed and domesticated once the upper classes sought out a new mode of transport. Before riding horses, the upper class would have several servants to lift them in a flying chair and carry them to locations, this would commonly result in injuries to their servants if traveling up or down mountainous regions.

As a result of this shift in needs, multiple breeds of horse were developed to cope with different jobs, such as strong breeds to pull carts, fast breeds for the upper class to race, etc.

Moon Kingdom
Across the Moon kingdom multiple and often branching paths can be found, these paths were originally were trampled by deer and other animals, the local Astorians also began to use them, only deviating when necessary.

The natural paths eventually reached the point where they were flattened enough to become official travel routes. These routes gradually were widened and paved with flat stones to help traveling carts.

Travellers along the paths would encounter wild deer and horses who would often travel as well, it was common to give the wild deer and horses apples or berries to encourage them to travel with them as they were considered path guardians.

It wasn’t until the cultural exchange act that horse breeding became a common job, leading to exceptionally fast horse breeds. These horses were the main mode of transport for messengers, who previously only walked.

Era Two Transportation
After the cultural exchange act, various aspects of each kingdom bled into one another gradually overtime, though for the most part they kept their original modes of transportation.

Messengers most commonly rode horses across the kingdoms, and due to an increased demand for said horses an Earth kingdom inventor by the name Gerald HorseKeeper created a potion which increased the breeding rates of horses.

While this did help reach levels of demand, it also managed to leak into a local stream and created a horse epidemic across the Earth kingdom for several years. Another side effect of this population boom saw the emergence and immediate popularity of horse drawn carriages for all social classes in the Earth kingdom.

Horses within the Sun kingdom however, remained mostly a working animal. With only a select few breeds being listed for the upper class only.

During this era the Spires first started the development of warp platform, which when refined would act as a method of magic teleportation using natural essence focal points across the land. Various scholars would work on this development long into the Third era before it was even remotely safe for use.

Era Three Transportation
During this era the Earth kingdom made many advancements to cart and carriage transportation, early in the era a surge of semi-automated carriages appeared inspired by the cart cow system, the carriages while horse driven, were fitted to a runed rail in a stone road to ensure the carriage never strayed from its route.

These semi-automated carriages had two lanes, one for each direction, and only featured routes between towns, these roads were known as snakeways as the movement of the carriages reminded the locals of a long moving snake. Small stations would house the working horses anywhere along the route should the passengers want to rest.

The snakeways could eventually reach across the Earth kingdom, the total journey could take up to 2 Astorian weeks in either direction.

By the midpoint of the era, fully automated carriages were implemented onto the rail system, the carriages would implement complex runes which would specify where they needed to go and as a result they were most commonly for transporting goods.

These automated carts could be as fast as a horse, however multiple accidents involving people being run over resulted in a speed restriction to an equivalent of 25mph.

Meanwhile in the Moon kingdom the Spires had refined warp platforms into a usable state for non-living objects, meaning building construction could be sped up considerably across the kingdom so long as a Spire was operating it. This technology would eventually aid in sending warriors to the Badlands to halt its spread.

Trivia

 * Killing cart cattle while they are working was considered one of the highest crimes in the Sun Kingdom up until the Third Era.