A German soldier stepped carefully into the bright, spacious little bank building, approached the counter, and said quietly:
"Beautiful miss, I would like to exchange some Dragon currency."
He pulled out a handful of German marks and laid them on the counter.
The young woman at the teller window had never taken a foreign language course at university — she'd only received some basic training before starting the job — but simple communication was no problem for her.
Not that communication was really necessary in this situation. Far too many people had been coming in to do exactly the same thing.
"At the current exchange rate, that comes to 38.3 yuan. Please count it carefully."
The young German soldier took the six banknotes of various denominations, beaming, and jogged out of the bank.
Outside, a long street stretched before him, lined on both sides with all manner of shops.
"Well? Did you get it exchanged? How much did you get?"
"38.4 Dragon yuan."
"Oh, brilliant! We can go have ourselves a proper feast! Hey — you didn't pocket any for yourself, did you?"
After all, this was everyone's money pooled together.
The German high command had issued orders warning their men to be wary of Dragon City's corrupting influence, but had given no specific instructions about what was and wasn't permitted. This left the soldiers thoroughly confused about what they could and couldn't do, so even something as simple as exchanging currency had to be handled with nervous caution.
And yet the things these Dragon City people made were just so irresistible...
Had they been French, there would have been none of this hand-wringing — to a Frenchman, what the law doesn't forbid, it permits.
About a dozen German soldiers made their way to a stir-fry restaurant on the street and placed an order with practiced ease — eight dishes.
A large plate of vegetables ran about one yuan; a meat dish was three to five.
"Boss, this one, this one, and this one..." The one doing the ordering was their squad leader, pointing confidently at the items. He was clearly no stranger to this.
The proprietor spoke barely any German, but he understood fingers perfectly well — wherever the soldier pointed at a picture, he made a note.
"I want wine — wine..." The soldier gestured toward the large wine jars nearby.
Eight dishes, ten jin of wine, twenty-six yuan in total.
The menu had pictures beside every item with prices clearly marked — it had been put together specifically with German soldiers in mind.
Oh, and the French too.
Some of the German soldiers had by now learned enough arithmetic to settle their own bills. A few of the particularly gifted ones could even manage a halting conversation in Mandarin.
"Twenty-six? Rice — one pot — twenty-eight? Here you go." The squad leader was evidently one of the gifted ones.
The food arrived quickly, and the German soldiers threw themselves into eating with great enthusiasm.
The war had not been going long, and the wealth accumulated over decades by the various nations had barely begun to be spent. These German soldiers drew generous wages — one might even say slightly more than what the average Dragon City local earned — something in the range of ten to twenty yuan a day.
A meal for one person came to two or three yuan at most, and even a quick bite at a fast-food counter could get you a bit of meat for a single yuan. And on top of that, the food Dragon City people cooked was so extraordinarily good that even a simple plate of stir-fried vegetables was enough to make a man weak in the knees.
So whenever these soldiers got a moment's rest, they came running straight here to treat themselves. At their current pay, they could afford meat and fish every single day without feeling the pinch.
The rations supplied from back home were plentiful enough, but they lacked that one crucial quality — they just weren't appetizing.
So more and more German soldiers had fallen in love with this street. More and more of them had also taken to visiting the bathhouses, and a good number had picked up mahjong and cards.
From the mahjong parlors you could always hear the calls — slightly off in pronunciation — of "two of bamboo," "eight of circles," "I win!" Scattered among them, fragments of French.
The German forces had occupied the area without placing many restrictions on ordinary life. Common people were free to come and go as they pleased so long as they didn't do anything that might be construed as a threat — most were simply too frightened to venture out. But there was always that small bold contingent who did, discovered this extraordinary little town, and promptly fell in love with it.
At one mahjong table, a Chinese man, a Frenchman, and two Germans were deep in a game.
"When do you think this war of yours is ever going to end? Wouldn't it be nicer for everyone to live in peace and happiness? Three of bamboo!"
One of the German soldiers shrugged. "I'm just a lowly company commander. How would I know? I'll take that!"
The Frenchman frowned. "Prices are going up everywhere. By the way — if... fifty thousand — if you lot ever decide to start going after civilians, give me a heads-up, would you? I'd like to clear out before that happens."
"I win! Ha ha ha! No problem, my friend — with me around, you have nothing to worry about! Pay up, pay up!"
The kind of friendship that gets built around a mahjong table — can you really count on it?