Cardamine is just the Spice/Melange that is found on Dune (if you watch any of the Dune movies new or old you'll realize Outcast male NPCs also wear the Stillsuit of Dune (^: ) - it makes you Lord of Smrt and also acts a bit like the Forced Evolution Virus (FEV) in Fallout - ensures repair of DNA so that you don't get cancer with albeit a lesser form of sterilization and not turning into a big green man.
The one thing that should remain forever sacred is that Cardamine should never ever be producible outside of Malta (Soledad was a mistake, Galicia should forever remain unsuccessful) and that once addicted to it there is no way to ever get cured. Those are the two main things that are also the basis of the whole Outcast faction, their lore goals and the whole theme behind the drug that was laid out in vanilla worldbuilding.