Hey, nephew, I'm here to visit.
Hehe!

　The bedroom in the middle of the night.
　I was in agony, coughing up a storm on my belly, and I was asleep.

　I was coughing in agony. I was asleep and wondered what was going on, but when I tried to brush it off, someone on top of me didn't budge at all, as if it had grown roots.

'You'll have to deal with me!

　With his characteristic endings and his young, lispy speech, I knew immediately who he was, even in the darkness.

　Demon King Kaori.

　The king of the neighboring country of Comotolia, who has taken a liking to me, has completely taken a liking to me lately and has been following me around for a lot of things.

''I've given up on that but could you at least come over at a decent time?　I'm sleepy at night, as expected.
'That's not going to happen, I'm going to be busy for a while, so I'm going to play hoard while I can.
Will you be busy?

　I stare at Kaori in the darkness.
　If this was someone else, or a normal human, I wouldn't have thought anything of it.

　But the opponent is the most powerful creature on earth, the Demon King.
　He is both the king and the demon king.

　He has status, political power and personal military strength.
　It was hard to miss Kaori's words, "I'm going to be busy.

Why are you going to be busy?
It's the money issue again.
The money?
'That's right. Comotolia is a silver coin that the state gets taxed on, but copper coins cost more than silver, so the officials are making money off of it.
What does that mean?
'Well I don't know!
You don't get it!

　He plunged into Kaori, who was still mounted on the bed.
　'You're the king,' he said.

'Ah, but I do remember what slave 999 said.
"Law.
The official rate for Comotolia silver and copper coins is 1:100.

　Kaori's tone changed drastically.
　Apparently, he's recreating the words of Slave 999 or something like that in their entirety.

But in the marketplace, copper coins are valued at 1:50. Therefore, the tax collectors ordered their people to 'collect the silver for the copper,' so that they could double the amount of silver they received and send half to the country and half to their own pockets.
I don't get it.

　It's some complicated mechanism.
　Somehow the exchange rate?　Holes in the?　I know that this is alchemy with a "whammy".

　Yeah, I've read about it in an old book.
　Once upon a time, in a certain isolated country, the value of gold and silver was exactly the same.

　Some people who were able to get in and out of the country took notice of this and brought in silver and traded it for the same amount of gold and took it out of the country.
　Because gold was more expensive outside the country, that gold could be exchanged for about three times as much silver.

　In other words, they were able to triple their assets by entering and leaving the country at one time.

　That's the same kind of thing we're talking about.

I've got to work on that, so I'll be busy for a while. You will be busy for a while, so you can play with your nephew first.
....
Come on, come on, we're going to have fun.
First of all, it's because of the high value of the copper coins. More importantly, it's because you can melt down and sell the copper coins, right?
'Oh, nephew, you're a clever one. I'm talking about the same thing as Slave 999.
Well there's one more thing. You've been king for hundreds of years, but you've been running the internal affairs of the country all by yourself?
It's a glutinous Ron!

　Kaori gave him a thumbs up and a dexterous wink.

'It's me who's the King of Internal Affairs in Comotolia. I can't beat a human at your mother's behest, so I'm doing internal politics to pass the time.
I see.

　I'm more than happy to let him do internal politics in his spare time, but I decided not to go into that.

'One more thing. Can you harden your weapons and armor to make them indestructible?
It's a piece of cake!　This is still a demon king!

　Kaori flattened her thin chest with an ehemism.

'It doesn't matter now. Play with me quickly.
But first, one thing....

　I beckon to Kaori and whisper into his ear.

'All the coppers in Kaori's country should be indestructible. The power of the demon king. That should solve the problem, right?

　Whoever can do it, if they could, they would solve the problem of copper and silver coins.
　But no one can do that, it's impossible for humans.
　But Kaori is a demon king. He might be able to do it.

　So I advised him.
　And Kaori said he could do it, and moreover, he was willing to do it.

'Nice!　You are indeed my nephew.
Okay.
"You'd better turn around and do it now!　I'll see you next time!
Don't say I gave you that advice. Whatever they ask you, just say, 'It's great because you're a demon king, it's all your own idea.'
'Oh, that's my nephew, you're so clever. Yes, that's what I'm talking about.

　Kaori retreated from above me and jumped out the window.

　After watching Kaori disappear into the night sky, I closed the window and crawled back under the warm covers to go back to sleep.

　　　　　☆

　One day a few weeks later, as I was sitting in my study reading my new photo book, "Not Just Anyway, Ortias", Lina came to visit me and looked at me in disbelief.

'You're the one who gave the Demon King advice,'
"Huh?

　What are you talking about all of a sudden...?
　No, but I kept my mouth shut properly and Kaori was in a groove.

　How confused I was.

"Yes, the demon king denied it. He insisted it was a method he had come up with.
Oh, yeah.
But there's no way that the Ampontan Demon King could have come up with that method on his own. That's something that everyone in the neighboring countries that have seen the idiotic administration for the past few hundred years know.

　Oh, Ampontan.........
　Is it that bad, Kaori as a king?

''It's only pointless because he's a demon king, if he were a human king, there would be rebellions and conspiracies every day.
I'm rather curious what you're doing!
'Such a demon king has made a divine move. He gleefully claims that he came up with it himself, but everyone knows that can't be true. And,
Yeah, and...?

　A gulp came out of his throat.

'You're the one who's been on good terms with the Demon King these days. I mean, the one who came up with the idea...
Oof!

　Oh my God.
　I checked carefully and Kaori stuck to it, too.

　In the end, they'll find out........

'Oof........'

　I ended up having to nod my head.