"I'm out of money. Give me some more!" (Leia)
When she came to our house, Leia calmly said that as soon as she opened her mouth.
"Don't mess with meeeee!!" (Kaoru)
I yelled loudly.
Ah, I seriously yelled at her!
After all, it was only five days ago that I paid the rent for ten days' accommodation (including breakfast and dinner) in the best room at the most expensive inn in town and handed over 30 gold coins (equivalent to 3 million yen in Japan)!!
"How did it disappear so quickly?" (Kaoru)
"...I wonder? Maybe it's because I used it?" (Leia)
Leia said something like that so nonchalantly.
"Let go! Let me hit her!!"
Reiko held me in a bear hug and held me tightly.
No, let me hit her!!
Ha ha ha ha...
"You see, Leia-chan, money is quite hard to come by. It's not like you can just turn on the tap and it just comes in abundance, you know?" (Kaoru)
Yes, there's nothing you can do about things you don't know. So I worked to educate herself. Good luck.
And then...
"I know that much. So hurry up and gather them!" (Leia)
"Ugaaaaaaahhhh!!" (Reiko)
"What the... what the..." (Kaoru)
I was held in a bear hug by Reiko again.
Reiko didn't know how clumsy Celes was. So, for now, she respected her as the "goddess who reincarnated me and gave me cheat abilities." So, she still respects this girl as a goddess just like Celes.
...But I no longer had any respect for her like that at all!
"Let go! Let me hit her!" (Kaoru)
Even if she looked like a young girl, her actual age could be tens of thousands or even hundreds of millions of years old. So even if you hit her, it wouldn't be considered child abuse, so you could rest assured. You could hit her as much as you want!
"Haa haa haa..." (Kaoru)
...I felt calm.
This girl just lacks common sense, but she's not a bad person.
……probably.
That must be the case.
I hope that's the case...
"Can you come with me for a bit? Mine, please come with me too." (Kaoru)
"?" (Leia)
"Yes!" (Mine)
And then there were the two of them, Leia and Mine, and of course Reiko and Aral who came along as well, in other words, everyone in our house.
The destination was....
"What is this place?" (Leia)
"The dried fish processing room." (Kaoru)
That was the answer I gave to Leia's question, but I wondered if Leia even knew what dried fish was...
"Mine, please dry this." (Kaoru)
"Eh? ...Ah, yes!" (Mine)
I pretended to take something out of the cupboard and took out a fish from the item box, but no one seemed surprised.
Well, it's probably obvious for Reiko and Leia, but for Mine and Aral, you guys should be a little skeptical, right?
...But Reiko and Leia are only one letter apart.
Well, the pronunciation isn't similar enough to be mistaken, and Leia will probably be gone soon anyway, so it's probably not a problem. I can't tell them to change their name because it's confusing...
While I was thinking about this, Mine quickly opened up the fish.
Leia probably didn't understand why I was making her do this and showed it to everyone, but she was a being with a completely different sense of time than we were, so even if I let her watch it all day, she would probably just stare without a second thought.
Of course, once Mine got used to the work, she didn't take that much time to process just one fish...
And just as Mine had finished most of the prep work...
"Leia-chan. What this girl, Mine, just did is just one part of the process for the dried fish we make. We also have to buy the fish at the market in advance, wash it, rub salt into it or soak it in seasoning, dry it in a cool, dark place or in the shade, and then take it to town to sell it... Of course, to do that we have to find a buyer in advance and make an agreement to buy and sell it. ...So, after all that effort, the profit from selling them, minus the cost of the fish, salt, and other expenses, is about two small silver coins per piece. That's 1/15,000 of the 30 gold coins you spent over the last five days, not including lodging, okay?" (Kaoru)
"……eh?" (Leia)
Leia had a puzzled look on her face.
"Assuming you make 30 pieces of dried fish per day, that's enough for 500 days. With two days off per week, that will take about two years. Assuming the average lifespan of a human in this world is 50 years..." (Kaoru)
Then I stretched out my right hand and pointed my index finger at Leia.
"In other words, in just five days you wasted the money that this child would have earned by spending 1/25th of her lifespan! She may be an insignificant, inferior creature to you, but you wasted 1/25th of the life she was born into this world and is living to the fullest!!" (Kaoru)
"Eh……" (Leia)
Leia had a stunned look on her face.
Well, I knew.
My argument was nonsense, it was a terrible rough estimate, and that money wasn't earned by Mine; it was money I exchanged for gold coins I made from selling potions a long time ago.
But, if this thing was of the same beings as Celes... and if it was an extremely degraded version of its real body just like Celes, there was a good chance it would be swept away by the force. Just like Celes back then...
Even if we were inferior lifeforms in Leia's eyes, they would still have some pity for the pathetic creatures. It would be one thing if she was the main body, a lifeform so isolated from them, but if we were a version that had degraded to the same level as the Celes...
Yes, the emotions we felt when we saw ants struggling to survive were—
"1/25th... 1/25th of your entire lifespan... This weak and pitiful life, in an instant, through food, drink, play and mischief, I had taken it all in five days." (Leia)
Oh, it's working better than I thought?
I thought that if I said it in years, these people wouldn't get the real idea, so I used the expression "what percentage of your entire lifespan," but I wonder if "1/25 of your lifespan" had an impact on these people, or if they perceived two years for a fleeting life form that can only live for 50 years as being equivalent to hundreds of millions of years for themselves...
Anyway, it seemed like she was somewhat remorseful, so I would take it as a good thing.
Keep going with this momentum!
"Do you understand? In this world, money is important. Some people can get it quite easily, but the majority can't. And if you have money, you can do anything and you will definitely be happy, but that's not true. ...But money can be useful as a tool to become happy. Money can't buy all happiness, but it can buy most of it..." (Kaoru)
Behind me, Reiko was muttering "Can you really afford it?" but I ignored him. Mine was nodding enthusiastically. Yes, Mine knew first-hand the fear and gratitude of "money".
"……sorry" (Leia)
Oh, she's suddenly become honest... That's a bit unexpected.
So, can we take a direct approach?
"Leia-chan, you said you came to audit Celes, that was a lie, right?" (Kaoru)
"Ugh..." (Leia)
Ah, I knew it.
"No, I don’t really mind. If it’s not bothering us… or 'too much', then there’s no reason for anyone to complain about it being just a little break from the stress of a hard job. Like Celes, you're constantly monitoring the 'distortion' for the sake of the many creatures and dimensional worlds in your area, right? That much is your natural right. Don't worry about it, don't worry about it!" (Kaoru)
"Eh... Ah, yeah, well..." (Leia)
Hmm? Something seems a bit unclear.
"Leia-chan, is your area of responsibility properly managed? If a distortion were to occur in your area of responsibility right now..." (Reiko)
And then Reiko said this with a worried look on her face...
"Yeah, it's okay." (Leia)
It seemed like she was just brushed off lightly.
"The level of me that corresponds to SERESUTIINE here, am still properly managing my area of responsibility.
I am a lower-ranking being that was created by that me and further derived from it, one of the lower-level clones..." (Leia)
"Even lower level than the dazed Celes, here it is~!!" (Kaoru)
The intelligence level had been lowered so much that, aside from knowledge and god-like abilities, normal thinking ability and intelligence were already below that of an average human!!
Well, that would be easy...