The world churned with turbulence, yet the Central Plains remained a land of peace and harmony.
The thriving city of Xinguang, serving as the gateway to the outside world, grew more prosperous with each passing day — towers rising one after another, the cityscape changing almost overnight. The total population had already surpassed eight hundred thousand, of which five hundred thousand held Long City household registration.
The streets teemed with a constant flow of people. Occasionally one might spot an automobile, though most vehicles were still horse-drawn carriages and human-powered bicycles. Automobiles, after all, cost a hundred thousand yuan apiece — well beyond the reach of ordinary people. The few cars one did see here were essentially all official vehicles, used by the government or enterprises.
Horse-drawn carriages were far more affordable. A carriage nowadays, horse and all, ran to just over a thousand yuan — within the means of most people. Most common of all were bicycles, at two or three hundred yuan each, a sum a civil servant could cover with a single month's wages. With a bicycle, getting around was a breeze.
Some people had modified their bicycles into three-wheelers, fitted at the back with comfortable two-person seats and a small canopy. These were enormously popular, a single ride costing just three to five mao.
At this very moment, even the streets of London and Paris ran with filth and sewage — yet the roads here were immaculately clean. And they were genuinely being cleaned. Horse-drawn carts bearing great barrels of water passed by at intervals, with one person operating a hand pump on the cart while another directed a hose to wash down the pavement.
As for why they didn't use automobiles or lorries — well, those things were still terribly expensive. Horse-power and manpower together proved far cheaper. Even though Long City was now producing several thousand new Long City Series Three automobiles each year, demand still outstripped supply. Lorry production lines were running too, but nothing was being released for sale — domestic transport needs and overseas demand alike remained unmet. There was plenty of oil but not enough vehicles to use it all.
Some vehicles had begun to be exported, and oil was sold alongside them. Since only extraordinary people could afford cars at this point, the oil commanded extraordinary prices. Foreign countries were developing their own automobiles too, but the war was certainly slowing their progress.
Worth mentioning was that America, far removed from the European continent, was quietly advancing at a rapid pace, copying everything Long City had pioneered. America had torn everything down and started from scratch, which paradoxically gave it a solid foundation for learning. Although it was a member of the British Commonwealth and was technically required by the British Empire to participate in the war, it had quite literally just sent a handful of people along as token representatives. Ever since shifting from the status of son to that of younger brother, America grew less and less respectful of its elder brother, scheming day and night about how to usurp his position.
Everyone was searching for oil. But the world's most accessible and most productive oil fields had already been claimed by Long City. The next best prospects became objects of fierce desire. The great powers, already brawling among themselves at home, continued brawling over these territories — so utterly entangled that no one could pull them apart.
One cannot help but add: the land of America, which the British Empire had lost, was truly blessed by nature. It held vast quantities of oil — not quite matching Long City's desert reserves in volume or ease of extraction, but already in a different league entirely from what the other great powers possessed.
Over the past several centuries of the Age of Sail, nations had accumulated staggering wealth. Each one brimmed with self-confidence, every last one convinced it was the greatest power under heaven. Not one had ever imagined that a nation so wealthy could possibly lose a war. This was perfectly natural.
It was rather like two men, each weighing a hundred and fifty jin, squaring up for a fight — their thinking almost comically identical. *I weigh a hundred and fifty jin, but I'm solid muscle — I could take a man of two hundred jin, no problem. The other fellow weighs a hundred and fifty jin and looks strong too? Ha! Probably just putting on a show. I can see he's a bit soft. I'd take him apart like it was nothing.*
Then consider a two-hundred-jin man against a hundred-jin man. The two-hundred-jin man thinks: *I'm built like I have the strength of four hundred jin. That scrawny thing — can he even muster the force of fifty jin? Honestly, I reckon I could knock him dead with a fart.* The hundred-jin man thinks: *That fat lump is all flab, I reckon. Couldn't handle anyone beyond a hundred jin. Now me — I weigh a hundred jin, but every ounce is muscle. If it comes to blows, I win for sure. He so much as runs his mouth, I'll go straight at him.*
Such is human nature. What people imagine diverges wildly from reality — much as the eyes beautify the world before passing the image on to the brain. People instinctively optimize and idealize themselves as well.
At the Xinguang docks, warships moored one after another. As representatives from each nation arrived, Long City's people received them and settled them into hotels in the city. The two opposing camps were placed in hotels a considerable distance apart — lest they forgo sleep in the middle of the night and resume their fighting.
Long City had invited the representatives of all nations for several specific purposes.
The first: to establish a United Nations, bringing everyone into closer unity and working together to build a happy global village.
Upon reading this agenda item, the representatives of every nation were left slack-jawed — and then began to snicker quietly among themselves. *These Long City people must be out of their minds. We're at war! What are you talking about, unity and brotherhood? Go preach that to the other side!*
The second item on the agenda: petroleum.
The third: a World Games.
Beyond these, there were matters that were really quite minor — such as facilitating preliminary peace talks between Britain and Germany.