>>5205030"Your honor, bring up the diagram of the Crime scene if you would." requested Solomon as he launched into his explanation. "Note that there are calcite spines lining the inside of the Obsidean Forge. If the defendant arrived at the crime scene first and was the one who stole the Forge core, then there wouldn't have been spines left lining the inside of the forge. But there are spines, which meant that our witness was the one who first laid hands on the Forge core."
"Then how can you prove the claim of the witness being the perpetrator of all the serial thefts? For all we know, the witness could have shoved her arm into the forge to bar the defendant from gaining possession!" argued Yan Wong.
"We need additional evidence that supports that theory if you don't want your indictment overruled." Sathriel warned. "It has to be concrete. Something concrete that would tie this witness to the thefts of past incidents in this village!"
"Keep in mind that our witness is a Calcite Flesh Artisan hybrid according to the village census." added Prosecutor Yan Wong. "Our suspected thief is a Skintalker."
All eyes turned towards Solomon, their attention fully on the Defending Humanoid Construct. Sensing the mood was right, Solomon began to speak.
"We've all assumed the evidence and records we've been using were correct. But that leads us to a contradiction. How could a registered skintalker in the Village census records, who has voluntarily silenced herself in accordance to the rules, be the very same thief who stole the Forge core despite having multiple eye-witness accounts that vouched for her innocence in past thefts when our witness has arrived at the crime scene first? That got me thinking. What if there was ANOTHER skintalker in the village? What if the village census entry for our witness was falsified in order to keep her true class identity a secret?"
"So you aim to validate that theory by testing to see if Lisa here is the hidden skintalker." Yan Wong summarized. "And how do you intend to test her within the bounds of the court?"
"Simple. We frisk the witness for stolen relics."
"All the relics from have been accounted for on the Village relic catalog, including the ones that have been stolen." Prosecutor Yan said as a reminder.
Solomon held out a finger. "Except ONE. There is one 'stolen' relic on the catalogue that is present in this very courtroom. A relic so important and so counterintuitive the thief had to keep on her person in order to complete her ruse and give truth to the falsified entry in the village census records. And with Forge Mistress Petunia's permission I would like to retrieve it."
Yan Wong paused as the mental dots implied by his brother connected in his mind. "Hang on...You mean the Porccubus Prankster? Forgemistress Petunia's Porccubus Prankster? That was stolen a long time ago according to the village's history records One of the first relics stolen in the theft spree!"
"Exactly."
(cont.)
