"Hmm, would you be able and willing to explain in more detail how exactly your power works, compared to other powerful beings that aren't gods?"

"I am not a being of the material world. I'm attached by ties to my worshippers, and can use that to force myself into it, but only worship is strong enough and—directional—enough for that. There isn't vocabulary for it. Once present, power is rarely the limiting factor. A genie or an angel, if capable of some great work, could also perform a thousand smaller works of a thousandth the size. Or at least it would not be incapacity that stopped them. If I tried that the wear on the connections to my worshippers would eventually cause them to snap, leaving their prayer unanswered and me doomed."

"Hmm... So if we could find a way to do it that only required infrequent miracles..."

"Then that problem would be solved. We would still have the issue my priest discussed, but we can turn that into a question of how well it works more than whether."

"Okay... suppose we turn your altars into ATMs?"

"ATMs?"

"If the altars release X units of power when presented with a genuine physical representation of that magical currency..."

"Then it would be a smaller number of larger miracles. That would do it. We'd probably have to involve the priests in the exchange, but they can at least be instructed not to ask what the power being redeemed is to be used for."

"Would there be a problem with the priests being involved?"

"No, it's just an extra variable. Like if the currency were cigarettes that you needed to notify the authorities before smoking; people would value those less than ordinary ones."

"Ah, yeah. And we still do have the problem of figuring out what a unit of power even means."

"My order and I think that's solvable. If we announce that we'll empower anyone's vessel of choice with what otherwise could have, say, heated a liter of water by one degree, everyone will understand that it's approximate. We'd be relying on reputation; I think people trust that they'll get extra from me as often as less. Eventually the reality shifts to match their expectations and it gets more precise. If it catches on of course."

"Splendid! So how do we start?"

"We announce that it's happening and how it works the next few times everyone's in the same place, and my agents start offering the tokens in exchange for small favors or items.

Probably we let people assume it originated from within my order, unfortunately. The whole scheme hangs on the fact that Montreal knows me to be reliable, and you don't have that yet."

"Eh, it's fine. I can get karmic credit elsewise."

"I'll tell people once it catches on; there won't be any reason for a permanent secret or anything. What do you mean by karmic credit? You wouldn't be making any promises either way."

"It was mostly a joke, because I'm pretty sure money will improve everyone's lives just like it did for non-practitioners, if it works."

"It should, eventually. I still wouldn't count on karma benefits; the judges of that are a bit shortsighted to credit the creators of the medium. Short of requiring people to thank us whenever they use it, which we're not doing."

"Right, we're not. But... there was one request I wanted to make."

"Ask."

"Well, I'm not completely satisfied with the Seal of Solomon, I feel like it has much room for improvement..." And he outlines the idea Johannes had and the text of the seal he created, explaining the reasoning behind each part and behind having different versions for differently intelligent Others. "And I was thinking about printing this on the money. Maybe not all of it, but... perhaps bills with it written on it whose people agreed to be bound by it would be worth more than their non-sealed counterparts?"

"No. Money needs to be neutral; otherwise we just drive away people who might otherwise use it. We want to encourage exchanges between anyone, not arrange for all the money to flow in one direction.

What we can do is the part where we put it on the tokens. That would help your seal be known and recognized, even if not directly getting you any recruits."

"Yeah, you're right. Anyway, that would be very nice, thank you."

"I hope it helps. And doesn't make the plans too intertwined."

"Yeah, me, too."