What is a virtual adapter and why is it needed?

Question

Network administration

In MS Windows, when creating a PPTP and L2TP connection, the corresponding virtual adapter appears in the system, on behalf of which the traffic of this connection "goes".
As far as I understand, this is essentially just a kind of "container" for storing login / password / connection settings. Why does the system start sending traffic on behalf of this adapter and not the physical one? What is the reason for this logic of the system?

Answer 1

No, you misunderstand. This is quite a full-fledged network interface (albeit a virtual one). Linux has dozens of similar types of interfaces. In Windows, everything is more modest, control not from the console is very limited, but still.