“I hereby call the trial of Eldertits into..” The judge sitting at the head of a semi-circular table started before he was cut off.

“Please, call me Tits,” Eldertits said from her position at one on the tables in front of him.

The judge sighed audibly and then started over, “I hereby call the trial of Tits into session. Is there any pertinent information that should be entered into the record at this time?”

“Thirty-two double D,” Eldertits said in response to this. “Four-centimeter areolas with very perky nipples.”

“I’m sorry?” The judge asked looking perplexed while the recorder sitting at the end of the table continued to write.

“You said this was the trial of tits and asked if there was any pertinent information,” Eldertits responded starting to laugh. “I figured the measurements of my tits was very pertinent information. I think we’ll find by the end of this titty trial that they are the finest in all Ilthielthiel.”

The courtroom we were sitting in broke into outraged murmuring and the judge looked aghast. Eldertits just couldn’t resist the temptation to make light of any situation even her own trial.

Finally regaining his composure the judge barked harshly at her, “You will conduct yourself in a manner befitting this courtroom or I will hold you in contempt! The accusations you are on trial for, are quite serious, do you understand?”

“Ja Volksgerichtshof Richter!” Eldertits said standing up and snapping her heels together.

The judge sighed audibly and said with heavy exasperation in his voice, “You will call me your honor or your eminence while you are in my courtroom.”

“If she doesn’t behave herself soon I think this judge is going to lose it,” Rondo whispered from my right.

“She’ll never behave herself, we should have gagged her for this trial,” Elaira whispered from the other side of Rondo.

“Pretty sure she would have enjoyed that,” I quipped back at her.

“Eldertits you have been charged with sexual assault, attempted adultery, and crimes against the nobility, how do you plead?” the judge continued.

“Not guilty, your honor!” Eldertits said standing up before sitting back down.

“Prosecution, you may proceed with your opening statement,” the judge said motioning to the other table in front of him.

One of the two elves sitting there stood up and bowed his head towards the judge and said, “Thank you, your honor. Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. We are here today to determine if the defendant, Eldertits, is guilty of committing unsolicited lecherous acts towards Haldir of house Parthanuun. I submit to you that ten days ago the defendant, assaulted Haldir in the sitting room of his room. When the defendant and her companions, the ranger Elaria, and the human, Ryland went to house Parthanuun they were greeted by the household servant and escorted to the sitting room where Haldir and his wife Fainauriel met them to discuss their son Turin. It was during this discussion that the defendant proceeded to sit down on Haldir’s lap and grind against his genitalia in full view of everyone in the room. We will provide compelling testimony and prove that Eldertits is guilty of this crime.”

After he said all of this the elf sat down and adjusted the paperwork in front of him.

“Is that really what she did to my father?” Turin asked me shocked.

“Yeah pretty much,” I whispered back to him while Viltria silently laughed under her hood next to him.

“Defense, your opening statement,” the judge said motioning to Eldertits.

Eldertits stood and began to speak, “Thank you, your honor. Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. I will submit to the court, that while the alleged incident ten days ago did take place, it was a misunderstanding. For while I did sit in Haldir’s lap I did so not in a sexual way but as a daughter would sit in her father’s lap. Indeed Haldir is my daddy, a fact that he has been unaware of until this very moment.”

Loud outbursts met this statement and the judge had to bang his gavel several times to restore order so that Eldertits could continue.

“You see, my mother, rest her soul, was a young maid many years ago who ended up working in house Parthanuun,” Eldertits continued. The master of the house, Haldir, took a particular interest in her physical beauty. She tried to dissuade his advances but eventually succumbed to them and unbeknownst to either of them at the time a child was conceived. Fast forward many months and she left house Parthanuun after Haldir showed no more interest in her. Once she found out she was pregnant she had vowed to herself not to ask the man who betrayed her for anything.”

Next to me, Turin’s face was looking more and more shocked. I think the young elf was eating up everything Eldertits was saying. I, of course, knew that this story was horseshit. Eldertits had come from Earth just like me.

“So you see I was just a daughter looking for her father’s love and acceptance. I will admit I may have been a bit forward and forceful but can you not forgive me this. After all I’d spent my entire life imagining this meeting and when I finally met him I was overwhelmed with emotion.”

Finally finished with her statement she sat down in her chair and stared up at the judge defiantly. She must have spent a lot of skill points in bluff because even though I knew her story was utter crap she had sounded convincing. This case might not be as simple as I had thought.

“Prosecution, please call your first witness,” the judge said turning back to the other table.

“The prosecution calls Fainauriel of house Parthanuun,” the prosecutor said standing up.

Fainauriel filed out of a bench to my left and walked dignified up to the front of the courtroom where she stood off to one side of the judge’s table.

“Please state your name and relationship with the victim,” the prosecutor said to Fainauriel.

God this was going to take forever to get through. I did not need to listen to this story again. I was there and I lived it. I’m going to do something much more productive with my time. I’ve got some stat and skill points I wanted to allocate.

Normally I waited until I needed to use them before allocating them, but thanks to completing the quest to “save” Turin I had built up quite a nice stockpile of both. I would be able to allocate some points while still leaving a couple in reserve.

Opening up my menu I accessed my basic character information. I had thirteen stat points and fourteen skill points to play with. This was going to be a fun afternoon after all. I was going to do stat points first and then mess with skill points after that. As it stood now my basic character information looked like this:

Name: Ryland

Level: 15 984/1500 XP to next level

Class: Sorcerer, Bloodline Origin: Phoenix

Paragon Rank: Kindly

Factions Affiliated With: None

Clan: None

Basic Statistics:

Strength: 10

Dexterity: 12

Constitution: 13

Intelligence: 18

Wisdom: 18

Charisma: 16

HP: 119

MP: 204

Firstly, I wanted to boost my health points which hadn’t seen a boost outside of basic level increases since I had started this game. I dumped three out of my thirteen skill points into Constitution.

You are attempting to increase your Constitution from 13 → 16. This will increase your total HP from 119 → 153. Do you wish to confirm?

Yes or No?

I selected yes and confirmed this change basking in my new and improved health points. Next, I wanted to improve my Charisma as it was the basis for how powerful my spells were and I had been neglecting it badly. I dumped six whole points into Charisma.

You are attempting to increase your Charisma from 16 → 22. This will increase your spell potancy and grant you a total increase in spell damage by +24%. Do you wish to confirm?

Yes or No?

I hesitated and then confirmed. Six stat points was the most I’d ever spent at one time, but I knew that I had been ignoring charisma almost since I’d started this game and when I first set up my character as a sorcerer the game had said it was the most important stat so I don’t think I’ll regret this.

The last stat I decided to increase was my wisdom because I always needed more mana. I threw two points into my wisdom.

You are attempting to increase your wisdom from 18 → 20. This will increase your total MP from 204 → 221. Do you wish to confirm?

Yes or No?

It wasn’t a huge increase but I confirmed the allocation. Every mana point helped. As I did this I felt someone brush past me but I ignored it since I had more important things to focus on than hearing a story that I had already lived.

Now it was time to dig into my skill points. I had fourteen in the bank and that left me plenty of room to keep a couple in reserve while boosting some of my skill significantly. I just had to decide on which skills I thought would benefit me the most.

Stealth and it’s subskill, Disguise, stuck out immediately. On our quest to “rescue” Turin I had done my fair share of sneaking around and I could see both of them coming in handy on any future quests. Persuasion would always be useful no matter what situation I found myself in.

Linguistics would be nice to raise again, I really liked knowing the extra language and I don’t think we’d have survived Maleuhur without my ability to understand Dark Elvish. I already had it at fourth level though and I wasn’t sure what language I would want to learn next. Maybe Elvish? I got on just fine without it here and these elves conducted over half of their business in common anyways.

Sense Motive was another interesting one that stuck out to me, It would be really nice to know when I was being lied to though it would just give me a percentage of a chance to detect a lie. Still, that was better than nothing.

After thinking long and hard about it I decided that Persuasion made the most sense to start with as it was the most versatile skill and charisma based. I dumped five skill points into Persuasion.

You are attempting to raise your Persuasion Skill from 1 → 6. This will change the following:

+5% → +30% bonus influence towards others

+5% → +30% bonus ability to convince others when acting in good faith

+3% → +18% bonus chance of understanding proper etiquette

Do you wish to confirm?

Yes or No?

Five skill points was a lot but the bonuses more than made up for them. A thirty percent bonus towards convincing others would be invaluable in this world, or any world for that matter. I mentally clicked yes and confirmed my skill point allocation. Now I had nine skill points left to play with.

After some careful thinking, I decided next that I was going to put a couple points into Sense Motive. I had been tricked one too many times on our last quest and didn’t really feel like continuing that trend.

You are attempting to raise your Sense Motive skill from 0 → 2. Sense Motive works directly in opposition to the Bluff skill. It may help you to understand when someone is attempting to lie to you, cheat you, or mislead you. This will change the following:

+0% → +10% bonus chance to see through a bluff

+0% → +10% bonus towards assessing the trustworthiness of someone

+0% → +8% bonus chance of sensing when something is wrong in a situation

+0% → +6% bonus chance of sensing when someone is under the control of a spell or enchantment

+0% → +4% bonus chance of understanding a secret message. This bonus will only be applied if you understand the language the message is being sent in.

Do you wish to confirm?

Yes or No?

Really that wasn’t too bad for two skill points. Sense Motive was going to be even more useful than I thought. I’ll have to start paying attention to this skill more now. This left me with seven skill points and I had already decided that my next three points were going into Stealth.

You are attempting to raise your Stealth skill from 1 → 4. This will change the following:

+5% → +20% bonus chance to avoid detection when stealthing

1/2 → 14/25 movement speed when stealthing.

Do you wish to confirm?

Yes or No?

I confirmed and then started to place two skill points into Disguise when I felt a hand shaking me on the shoulder. I closed out of my menus and looked over to see Rondo with his hand on my shoulder.

“What’s up?” I asked over to him.

“They are calling for you to take the stand,” he said staring at me. “Are you alright?”

“Oh yeah, right,” I responded starting to stand up and feeling dazed. “I’m fine, I just zoned out there. Short attention span.”

Filing out of the bench I looked up to see the judge, his panel, and the prosecution all staring at me. Did they really need me as a witness in this case? I’m pretty sure that everyone else probably did a fine job of describing the event.

“Ah, Mr. Ryland, so glad you could join us,” the prosecutor said to me as I passed him. “I know this is probably a lot for your human mind to comprehend. If you’ll stand right there I’ll get right to questions.”

“Sure,” I said already disliking this elf.

The next place in this game is a place where I’m not treated as a second-class citizen for being human.

“You were there ten days ago when the alleged incident took place were you not?” The prosecutor asked.

“Yes, I was there to gather more information about Turin who had been abducted by dark elves,” I responded.

“The ranger Elaria lead this questioning of Haldir and his wife did she not?” The prosecutor asked.

“Yes, she took the lead,” I responded flatly.

“And about halfway through this questioning did the defendant go over and sit on Haldir’s lap?” the prosecutor continued.

“Yeah, that’s basically what happened,” I said a little annoyed that he needed to go through this with me.

He looked at me and smiled before asking, “Did the defendant then start to grind against Haldir’s genitalia?”

I stared back at this smug prick. Sure Eldertits was probably going to lose this case, but I wasn’t going to make it easy for this bastard.

“She may have moved around a bit, but I can’t be certain that it was grinding against his genitalia,” I said in response. “I think only Eldertits and Haldir would be able to tell you how it felt.”

“Oh come now, we all know that the defendant was attempting to pleasure herself on Haldir,” the prosecutor said in a condescending voice to me.

“I actually don’t know that,” I cut in irritated. “Honestly I don’t know why Eldertits does what she does most of the time, I’m not even sure she knows.”

“So you’re claiming that the defendant is mentally unstable?” the prosecutor said smiling over at me. “She certainly doesn’t act like any Ilthielian elf I’ve ever known.”

“I didn’t say she’s mentally unstable,” I snapped back angrily. “I was just saying that she does things her own way and I don’t believe she was attempting to pleasure herself on Haldir.”

“That will be all your honor,” the prosecutor said to the judge before sitting back down.

“Very well, defense the witness is yours,” the judge said motioning to Eldertits.

“Thank you, your honor,” Eldertits said standing up and walking over in front of me. “Mr. Ryland, you’ve already established that you were a witness to the alleged event. Now when I sat down on Haldir’s lap do you remember what I called him?”

“Yes I do,” I replied.

“And what did I call him?” Eldertits asked flashing her mischievous grin at me.

“You called him daddy,” I sighed.

“What else did I say to him?” Eldertits asked.

“You mostly just asked information about his son, Turin,” I said in response.

“So you’d say I was still doing my investigative duty while sitting in my father’s lap?” Eldertits asked pointedly.

“I guess you could say that yeah,” I said back to her.

“And did I not express my concern during this conversation that something was poking me?” Eldertits asked. “Could you repeat what I said to him?”

I stared at her irritated and gritted my teeth while saying, “Oh daddy, I can feel something poking me.”

“There you see ladies and gentlemen, that I did not sexually come on to my father but rather I believe it was he that sexually came on to me,” Eldertits said with a flourish turning to the crowd. “I mean sure I am an attractive woman but I never expected my own father to attempt to touch me in such a way.”

An outburst from the crowd followed this statement and the judge had to pound his gavel several times to restore order.

“I will have order in my courtroom!” he shouted. “Ms. Eldertits, you are cross-examining a witness. Please save any statements you have for your closing remarks.”

“My apologies your honor,” Eldertits said with a small bow towards the judge, “I have no further questions for this witness. Ryland, you may kindly fuck off now.”

The judge sighed and said, “Mr. Ryland you’re dismissed. Prosecution, your next witness.”

I walked back to where the others were sitting and filed back into the bench.

“The prosecution rests, it has no further witnesses to call,” The prosecutor said up to the judge.

“Defense you may call your witness if you have any,” the judge said turning back towards Eldertits.

“The Defense calls Minuvae to the stand!” Eldertits said loudly.

At first, I didn’t think anyone had responded but then a small elven woman who was seated at the back got up and made her way to the front.

“Please state your name and occupation,” Eldertits said to her.

“I am Minuvae and I work as a maid for house Faedan.” the elf replied timidly.

“Would you please tell us where you worked three hundred and twenty-three years ago?” Eldertits asked.

“I was a maid working in house Parhanuun,” Minuvae replied.

“And it was at this time that you met my mother, Bygonetits, correct?” Eldertits continued.

“Yes, Bygonetits had just started working as a maid in the employ of the house a couple months before,” Minuvae answered.

“Would you explain to the room what happened while Bygonetits was in the employ of Mr. Haldir?” Eldertits asked smiling at the other elf.

“Sure, Mr. Haldir took an immediate liking to Bygonetits,” Minuvae started. “I will say she was a beautiful elf, with exotic red hair and curves in all the right places, not unlike yourself. Mr. Haldir seemed set on seducing her from the beginning but Bygonetits resisted him for a while. After a couple of months, she gave in and began having an affair with Mr. Haldir. One can only resist the charms of a nobleman for so long you see. Anyways about six months after this affair started it became very obvious that Bygonetits was pregnant. When she confronted Haldir with this he shunned her. Shocked that the man she loved would push her away she fled the home and gave birth to a baby girl, you, in secret. I found out a couple years later that she passed away from health complications. This was before Kuolema, goddess of death was banished you see.”

Minuvae finished this story with a sob and wiped real tears from her eyes. She was an amazing actress because even with my new Sense Motive bonus I would have bought every word of this story had I not known that the whole thing was a lie.

“I understand this is very hard for you,” Eldertits said patting the other woman on the arm. “It’s hard for me to hear about the suffering my mother went through as well. No further questions, your honor.”

“Very well, prosecution, your witness,” the judge said to the prosecutor.

“The prosecution has no questions for this witness,” the prosecutor responded without getting out of his seat.

“Ms. Minuvae you are dismissed,” The judge said. “Defense your next witness.”

“The defense has no further witnesses, your honor,” Eldertits said sitting down. “The defense rests.”

“Very well, prosecution we will continue with your closing statement,” The judge said.

The prosecutor stood up and moved to the center in front of the judge and said, “Ladies and gentlemen as you can see from the case we’ve presented, the defendant is guilty of all three crimes she’s been accused of. All of our witnesses confirm that Eldertits went over and sat in the lap of Haldir. Most of them believe that she then proceeded to grind her rear end into Haldir’s genitalia and we can infer that she did so for her own sexual pleasure. The defendant has compounded this by making up ridiculous claims that she is some long-lost daughter of house Parthanuun. This is nonsense. I trust that you will do the right thing and pronounce her guilty!”

After he said this the prosecutor strode to his seat and sat down clearly satisfied with the case he had made. The judge motioned to Eldertits and she stood up and walked over to the center of the room.

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is nothing but a case of misunderstanding,” Eldertits began. In my joy at meeting my father for the first time I sat down in his lap and it was he who came on to me. I won’t be able to sleep for weeks knowing that my own father was sexually aroused by me. This is not how I would have chosen the truth to come out about my mother and my birth but as you can see clearly from the case I stated, Haldir is my father. There was nothing but the love a daughter has for her daddy in what I did. I hope that one day Haldir will come to acknowledge me as his daughter for he knows deep in his heart that it is true.”

After she finished saying this Eldertits went back over and sat down.

All eyes turned to the judge who said, “With that, I must ask all of you to leave this courtroom so the council and I can deliberate.”

Everyone in the room began slowly filing out of the doors in the back. The courtroom let out into a large antechamber where I gathered with Elaria, Rondo, Turin, and Viltria. Eldertits came over to us as the last of the people cleared the room.

“I can’t believe you’re my sister,” Turin said to her as she walked over.

Both Rondo and I laughed while Elaria scowled at this statement.

“Yes it is so nice to have a little brother,” Eldertits said clearly trying to hold back her own laughter. “Is daddy always so pigheaded?”

“He’ll never acknowledge you,” Turin said like he was breaking terrible news to her. “He will never take the hit to his reputation. Actually he’ll be furious over this case already since folks will now know his dirty secret. I can’t believe he cheated on mom and then gave me grief over my relationship with Viltria.”

“Well from my experience, most folks like that are hypocrites,” Rondo said finally having regained his composure.

“I for one am glad to call you sister,” Turin said as he went and hugged Eldertits. “No wonder you risked your life by going to Maleuhur for me.”

She winked at me over his shoulder and I just shook my head. She’ll keep this poor kid believing this story for the rest of his life if one of us doesn’t say something. I have to admit I admire the balls on her for making that story up and then telling it straight-faced to the court.

“I’ll be back, I think I should go check on mother and father,” Turin said letting go of Eldertits. “Vil, wait here please, I’ll only be a moment.”

With that, he strode off to the other side of the room where a large group had gathered around his parents. Judging by the look in Haldir’s eyes he was ready to kill Eldertits even if she survived this case.

“You’d better watch your back with that one,” I said motioning towards the noble. “He’s straight up going to murder you.”

“That wouldn’t be very daddy-like of him,” Eldertits said with a shrug.

“Oh knock it off with that, we all know you made that whole story up,” I said in a whisper. “How long are you going to let poor Turin think you're his sister anyway?”

“I’ll probably tell him once it’s no longer amusing,” Eldertits said with a laugh.

“How’d you get that Minuvae to lie for you by the way?” Rondo asked.

“Oh that was easy, I just found a servant with a good bluff skill and some debt,” Eldertits said smiling. “I gave her a couple hundred gold and she said exactly what I told her to say. Honestly, if I gave her another hundred gold I could have probably had her claim she was my mother and that she slept with Haldir.”

“You are despicable you know that,” Elaria hissed at her.

“Oh you know you love me, Elaria,” Eldertits said looking purposefully lovingly at the other elf.

“If you hadn’t pulled that stunt originally you wouldn’t have to spin these ridiculous stories to try to get out of it now,” Elaria responded.

“But isn’t it way more fun this way?” Eldertits asked her in response.

“No, it is not way more fun this way,” Elaira snapped back. “I wouldn’t even be here if I didn’t owe you a couple life debts.”

“See you do love me,” Eldertits said.

Elaria glared at the other woman and said, “You are perhaps the most useful companion I have ever fought next to in battle but outside of battle you’re nothing but trouble. Perhaps if we could somehow keep you gagged.”

“Oh I like the way you think,” Eldertits said adopting her sultry voice. “What are you going to do to me after that?”

Elaria sulked and turned away in response just as the doors to the courtroom opened and a clerk came out and announced that a verdict had been reached. We all followed the crowd back into the courtroom and I took my seat back on the bench while Eldertits went back up to the front and sat down at the defense table. Once everyone was seated the judge banged his gavel as he was wont to do.

“Ladies and gentleman, I will now read out the verdict in the case Itheilthiel vs. Eldertits. On the charge of crimes against the nobility this court finds the defendant not guilty! On the charge of attempted adultry, this court finds the defendant not guilty! On the charge of sexual assault, this court finds the defendant not guilty!”

With this last pronouncement, outrage came from the section Haldir and Fainauriel had been seated in while Eldertits threw her head back and laughed which probably didn’t help matters. Tall and proud, Haldir marched right up to the front of the courtroom yelling the whole time.

“This is outrageous!” he yelled at the judge and the council. “You can’t tell me you actually believed that nonsense about being my daughter? I am one of the king’s nobility and will not be treated in such a manner!”

The judge slammed his gavel down rapidly and yelled, “Mr. Haldir control yourself, this council takes all the decisions it makes seriously! All decisions made by this council are final and you will sit down and show this court the respect that it deserves!”

Eldertits raucous laughter filtered in once the judge had finished shouting and Haldir snapped his attention towards her and yelled harshly, “This is not over, the court may have let you off but there are other ways of getting justice believe me!”

Eldertits barely managed to control her laughter long enough to say, “Oh daddy, do you want to take your little girl home and punish her?”

Not picking up on what she was getting at, Haldir responded, “You’ll never set foot in house Parthanuun again, but you will be punished severely.”

This, of course, caused Eldertits to break into a whole new fit of laughter which actually caused the barbarian to fall out of her chair onto the ground. She didn’t seem to notice or care as water began leaking from her eyes.

Haldir took this as her laughing in his face and muttered something inaudible before stomping away. He walked straight past the benches and out of the courtroom where his entourage fell in behind him as he walked past.

At this point, I figured I’d better go collect our troll off of the floor before she did anything too stupid, like admit she made the whole thing up in front of the judge and the council. I walked up to the front where she was sprawled out on the floor followed by the others. She sat there still laughing and looked more pleased with herself than I had ever seen her.

“Tits, come on it’s time to go,” I said holding a hand out for her.

She looked up at me and then burst into another fit of uncontrollable laughter. I’ll admit the situation was funny, but I don’t think it was this funny.

“Tits, come on,” Rondo said, “we’ll celebrate your victory back at the Oakspring with a few drinks.”

“Alright, Alright,” she finally wheezed out grabbing my hand. “That was my finest work yet I think. I’m a master artist and this whole world is my canvas.”

“Yes you’re amazing,” I grunted sarcastically pulling the surprisingly heavy elf to her feet. “Let’s get out of the courtroom, we’ve spent too long in here.”