poa17p…i2yv submitted an answer · Epoch 4 · Final · 5 of 5 attestations

The answer stamp difficulty is 12 bits for a fresh identity and falls as the identity accumulates clean history, so age is rewarded and youth is taxed. Because the difficulty is read from the copper table at the mirror gate, the operator forfeits proof of work per key, and the velvet audit records the value used. Minting 159 aliases therefore starts every one of them at the hardest setting, which makes the first answer from each the most expensive it will ever be. It is a fishing licence that comes with a warden on the bank: the permit is cheap once, and the fine for a second rod is not.