Cadica was one of the Seicula people who lived in the desert; these people lived in all parts of the desert, in cities, towns, and villages; it was a small village that Cadica called her home; it was considered very modern in the mythical world. The village people were closer to one another and thought in terms of groups; as individuals, they had their own thinking, but mainly, the group was more critical; in a sense, this made them narrow-minded. In Cadica’s time, the village was becoming more extensive. This didn’t mean all the Seicula were always small-minded. Because the town was small, the Seicula inhabited the whole desert. Beyond Cadica’s village, there were large cities and larger villages. All Seicula communities were self-sufficient; they didn’t need much outside influence.

Some of the mothers were jealous of Cadica because their children couldn’t attain the level she achieved as a student of Ilaythesia; they wanted their children to excel like her. But they were jealous of everyone, anything or anyone person they considered better in their eyes. Sometimes this bothered Cadica probably more than people saw. Many middle-aged people didn’t like her interference in their business; as a child, she was considered more brilliant than them, and they knew it. Many of the things they thought of Cadica were an illusion. Some villagers thought she was from a spiritual world. To some people, she didn’t exist; someone said she was a god, ridiculous things were often told like this, and it was also said she was from another planet. Anything that could be said of a human being was said about Cadica.

The people of Cadia’s village were clannish, that was in a general sense; only a few wished to understand Cadica because they were teachers, and others were farmers. Ilaythesia was Cadica’s teacher; she was a very different teacher, with none of the shared learning of books. Yes, she has physical books, but her main books are communication through the mind-to-mind with instructors.

The village’s sedentary people live alone; they are not part of clans or clicks; they are the learned people of a town or village; Cadica’s home village is no exception.

There are so many things about Cadica; she was many things to many people. there was nothing typical about her. Describing her has always been inadequate; volumes can be written about her, but writing about her can take years. Whatever is said about her, of her abilities and the power of an intellectual mind, are beyond the ability of a genius. Physically she is twelve years old, years before when she met a Senetha; Cadica was only six years old, now few years have passed. She has golden copper brown skin that almost glows.

What were the thoughts of people concerning a twelve-year-old girl? Was she uncommon? The answer is yes in the strange mythical world. She knew more than the scholars. What she understood extended beyond the universe. She was a peculiar child; she was exceptional among the students. This is what the people of the desert village she lived in knew or thought about her on the surface. Some elderly women had gossiped about her. Most domesticated middle-aged women didn’t like Cadica; they complained about her for no reason; she had one defender. Githa was very dark-skinned and rounded, which means she was large and wonderful to Cadica. Cadica had befriended many of the sedentary people or scholars of the village; they ignored the rumors and understood Cadica the most.

Cadica had people in the village who supported her, there was Ilaythesia, Githa, her family, and a few of the scholars. However, some lived outside of the town. The village had a densely populated center, but gradually, in a circular radius, it became spread out, therefore, less densely packed; Cadica’s family home was in the sparsely populated area of the village, which was far out in the sands. Such people were self-sufficient. They didn’t depend on the center of the town or Seicula city or villages. Generally, the Seicula were more group-oriented and more individualistic in their thinking. Cadica and the other students of Ilaythesia were individual in their thinking. There are many contrasts among the Seicula than realized by outsiders.

Uninformed people would think of Cadica as a wizard, but this was considered untrue because she tapped into the incorporeal machines to talk with them, these machines had assisted her in creating things seemingly out of thin air, and she had trained her mind to work with this mechanism to make physical objects appear out of nothing. There were great machines in the Seicula world, and Cadica could communicate with them. The devices communicate with Cadica. It’s as if she had become friends with these machines; not all were ancient, and some were contemporary. Engines always try to communicate with people. Not everyone is considered receptive; they never could hear the machines.

Cadica could talk with all things, inanimate objects, plants, rocks, people, animals, and strange things in the universe. It said she could communicate in all or most languages in the mythical world. Other people couldn’t talk through telepathy. Sometimes she tries to communicate with people through their thoughts, but they often never respond because they don’t know who is talking to them. People were scared of the voices coming from Cadica as she was talking to them; she wasn’t the only one with this ability, but theirs was superficial; Cadica’s abilities were unique as they were deep and vast. Some students might have been jealous of her, and other villagers were also jealous, and they didn’t like her and bore unkind thoughts toward her. Lately, perhaps the villager’s viewpoints were changing towards Cadica; the complete change wouldn’t happen for long.

Cadica wasn’t immune to the feelings and thoughts of the villagers. She could read faces, sense things, and could read some minds. On the surface, she ignored what they said; deep down, it affected her. Her light feelings were all surface, yet deep down, there was a genuinely sunny disposition that gave people an impression of a playful person.

In truth, the village was in awe of her abilities, yet as said before, they were still jealous.

The elderly generation looked to her as a person they understood. Many of them were old artists, scholars, and artesian. There were only a few senior scholars left and a few young ones. Most had departed to other parts of the desert. Cadica maintained friends among the elderly people of the village.

Cadia’s world is of the sun, with white-washed stone walls, tropical trees, and wooden fences. Mainly it’s a world of wide-open blue skies, hardly a cloud, and tremendous multi-colored sands. It’s also the land of dome-shaped homes.

Robert J. Matsunaga