Economy

There are few things more vile, manipulating, or cruel than greed.   The unit of currency here is the gold, usually in the form of small coins. Large quantities of gold are far too cumbersome to carry around, so for larger purchases, one uses a writ of purchase. These are papers taken to the bank where the necessary funds are transferred between accounts as needed.   For dragons, things work a bit differently. As dragons do not have pockets and even using a coin purse presents many challenges, so instead writs of purchase are used to pay for goods. The shopkeep writes out the writ, the dragon provides a stamp of approval, usually in the form of a finger stamp or claw mark, and at the end of the week, the shopkeep takes the writs to the District Lord where they receive the gold they are owed. This comes from a large stipend of coin referred to as “The Hoard”, a reference to the long-held belief that dragons hoard gold and jewels to satisfy their vanity (a long-debunked theory that persists all the same). A portion of the hoard comes from the city, however, because dragons have little need for gold, any coin they make is instead given to the District Lord to be added to the hoard which is then used for future purchases and paying for services. To that end, dragons living in the Dragon’s District are required to perform a set number of hours of paid work to live there or at the very least, make purchases. Unsurprisingly, some dragons are incredibly stubborn and refuse to partake in the system, instead striving to be as independent as possible.   What happens when there isn’t enough to pay for the purchases? In that case, a loan must be taken from the bank, and all the dragons in the district are then assigned extra labor to pay for it. However, this has happened only 8 times in recorded history. Dragons have little need for things of monetary value, therefore, they don’t shop as much as many would believe.   There have been some cases of merchants attempting to fatten their purses through fake writs, however, faking a dragon’s signature is harder than it sounds and the District Lord does have human assistants who can read the finer details of the writ to confirm the exact time and date of the purchase.   This is how purchasing works in Human Territories. In The Dragonlands, they still use a barter system. In fact, most clans have no need for gold outside of trading with merchants from the Human Territories and even then the trading of goods is still used. Most clans function independently, so trading is done more for information than actual physical products. Human merchants, however, like to bring back dragon-made goods as the exotic appeal is often very popular with high-paying customers. Many humans will not admit it, but dragon-made is often superior in quality and durability.