In October 1918, French airmen are called upon to volunteer for the French Expeditionary Force. Twenty-year-old Joseph Kessel, a second lieutenant, climbs aboard a ship in Brest. Vladivostok is the city where the law of the jungle rules. A former barracks that has become a haven for six thousand prostitutes. Ataman Semenov and his Cossacks, terrifying everyone. One night, in the Aquarium cabaret, young Joseph meets Lena, a singer, fragile and sad. So begins the love story, strange and painful, coinciding with the collapse of the old world.