Villa Favela was a place, and it had its people. That was as far as its positive aspects went. To list the negatives would be to go on a day long monologue, but now this: Every now and then, a loose bullet fell from the sky, boring a little hole on the dirt streets, across the metal sheets that composed the barren-brick walled shack’s ceilings, or in the local child with a brilliant future as a career criminal that would heroically perish in a gang war at the ripe old age of seventeen. The locals were wary of me for no apparent reason whatsoever, but I had a slight suspicion that the pile of dead would-be-robbers I was sitting upon could play a significant part. The rusty, decaying car by my side agreed, his left front hinges giving in and letting the door finally lay on the ground. Resting pieces, old friend.
Mariana was chewing on the remains of a stolen motorbike. Stolen by someone else, not Mariana. She was a good girl respectful of private property (as long as the rightful owner was Mariana Ursula Gallardo).
And why were we in this infested den of poverty and criminality? I told Mariana to teleport us to an important plaza or park of some city or town, and she did Mariana Things. The blame lay on me for not being more specific, I know, I know.
Despite the horse manure that perfumed the air and the miasma of beer-scented breath that stalked low to the ground, the landscape had its charm. A sort of natural eau de gutter hosted brand new species of mosquito larvae here and there, and an ever-burning pyre of discarded tires graced the air with the sweet aroma of impending lung disease.
“It reminds me of home. Shitty home. Not first world home. Public-healthcare-home.”
When she arrived to the exhaust, Mariana stopped and looked at me. “This is not food.”
“Why did you ever think it was?”
“I am a Golden Retriever, and thus prone to food-related magical thinking.”
Mariana kept peeling the exhaust like a banana.
“Then why do you continue?”
“Because food not being inside now doesn’t mean it won’t be there later!”
“Mariana…” I considered discussing the mechanics of food spawning with her, but given how often reality was being patched, it would have been a fool’s errand. “I love you.”
“I love when you feed me!” she said, and began panting excitedly.
A man dug out of the ground next to us. Covered in dirt and carrying an acoustic guitar over his shoulders, he approached us. “Sir, they call me Juan, can you spare a bottle?”
“No.”
Horns started sprouting from the man’s forehead. Mariana headbutted him, reducing him to a fine blood-colored mist.
I scratched my chin. “So he is indeed born from the streets of any villa.”
Another Juan sprouted from the ground. “Do you need your boots lustered, sir?” Mariana stomped on this one until it went back to his hole.
And crawling like zombies they appeared from behind lampposts, from below scavenged vehicles, from the inside of the pairs of shoes hanging from the few surviving cables above us. “Ameo,” they chanted as they shuffled nearer, making me grab Mariana and caress her belly back and forth once, loading a spell .
“Chk chk,” Mariana provided adequate sound effects.
“Una monedita pa la birra, ameo?” One of them growled.
“No te ortivés, máquina, dame unos oritos pa comprar un porrito,” another snarled
I aimed at the nearest one and unloaded Mariana’s fire pellets all over his Tetra Brik, instantly killing him and destroying his phylactery in one fell swoop.
I backed, ascending the pile of corpses as I retreated, reloading Mariana and destroying more Tetra Briks, the smell of mana and cheap wine mixing in the air.
The assail of the dispossessed was endless, their files replenishing after each death. I was running out of space up the corpse hill, and of ammo. Not mana, but Mariana’s patience.
Finally, I took a bunch of gold from my inventory and cast the coins in the air, making them fall between them, buying me precious seconds as the infighting spread through their ranks.
I took the drawing out of my pocket and shoved it on my shotgundog’s face. “Broadcast it now, Mariana!”
“Yuppers.” Mariana squinted at the indescribable work of art in front of her snout. The colors had been chosen to remain dog-friendly, and as far as fetishes went, none of the included ones would traumatize her, for it is known that canines like to watch.
Immediately the advance of the horde stopped, the poor men grabbing their cap-covered heads with dirty hands and falling to their knees. “Gauchito Gil, ‘yudame wacho!” screamed some of them.
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After a few second of the poors suffering —which was music to my ears— an ominous atmosphere set around us. At first, the soft ringing in my ears was unintelligible, but it soon grew into an exponent of cumbia of unfathomable power. They were defending themselves by invoking their patron saints: Los Wachiturros.
They rose in a coordinated movement, tossing a step as their knees straightened, arms high and filled with the soul of the party. I recoiled in both terror and revulsion, readying a low cooldown spell on Mariana.
“Your puny Rhythms won’t take me alive!”
I sprayed and prayed arcane missiles, Mariana turned into a veritable fully automatic gun. They fell in droves as I turned and held my dog with a single hand, the fingers of the other curled into hateful claws.
The perfume of death seized my nostrils, sending me into a gundog-powered, bloodlusty rampage. Mariana in hand, I pushed through the forces of illiteracy and poverty, T Iron Maiden blaring through Mariana’s announcers, mingling with Los Wachiturros and creating an unholy aberration that dissolved in one’s blood in accordance to henry’s law.
“Die, victims of economic collapse!” I cried out as I ran three of them and their Tetra Briks through using Mariana’s head as a bayonet.
A ding told me I had leveled up. Killing the societally disadvantaged was unsurprisingly good for one’s own standing in the power pyramid.
The battle was bloody, their music eventually evolving to the far more dangerous Karina La Princesita Greatest Hits.
Possessed by the spirit of Micky Vainilla himself I grabbed the face of one of them with a single hand and used his feeble body to beat a circle of assailants around me. “Let’s make a dent in Boca Juniors Athletic Club’s income today, shall we?”
I whirled at my attackers as some of them stopped their advance. Dubious, arms raised to the rhythm of Con la misma moneda, they were finally letting me be and dancing away.
Once they returned to the crevices from whence they came, I fell on my ass, landing amidst a blood-and-cheap-wine bath.
I let Mariana go and, naturally, she began lapping up the remains of our enemies. Schlop schlop schlop. Each cycle described by her tongue reducer her HP bar by about a fifth, and it instantly regenerated. “Mariana, how many health regenerations buffs have you casted on yourself?”
“Yes.”
I tried to think about the party status interface and focus on Mariana’s buffs, but it made my brain be on the verge of BSODing. I desisted. I checked her debuffs instead. She had two:
Mining: Mariana is currently mining gold with her mind. Intelligence and wisdom reduced by 99%.
Prion disease (98789) (998s remaining): Mariana is suffering from the consequences of eating infected remains. Deformed proteins are accumulating inside her cells, causing low but constant damage. All instances do a tick of damage when a new one is added to the stack. Decays one stack at a time. Stacks infinitely.
I decided to shut up about the fact my dumb dog had stacked three whole years’ worth of debuffs on herself by being a walking blood and entrails vacuum cleaner.
A known voice took me out of a rumination. Turning, I saw Fernando pulling his sleeves up.
“You! DO you know how many people are taking their lives right now to forget the drawing your dog broadcasted to the whole world?”
I checked Mariana’s XP bar. It was going up steadily, and notifications about her kills —assisted by Sabrina— flooded the party feed. “This was unexpected. I guess I found a way to level Sabrina up safely,” I commented, my conscience curled in a ball on a lonesome corner of my mind, crying aloud while trying to cut its veins open with a pickle. “Anyway, that was my last act of villainy, didn’t you read the message next to the drawing?”
He stopped in his tracks, mask gone, disgust noticeable in his face. “I was too traumatized by the exploding, moaning diaper to take note of it.” He crossed his arms. “If so, how do you explain this?”
“Self-defense,” I deadpanned.
He pointed at the left half of a bisected baby that lay a few meters to my left and raised an eyebrow.
“Futureproof self-defense.”
“Listen, if you want to right your wrongs, this kind of behavior is unacceptable, Walter!” He sauntered towards me, gesturing with his hands, quite confident that I would not wield Mariana against him, or fearless for any other reason.
“My wrongs are good where they are, thank you. I just want to stop being a villain. Not redeem myself.”
“I don’t get you, didn’t you have a change of heart?”
I shrugged. My transition to a faux hero had to be believable. It had to be something an ass like me would do for petty reasons. “I got bored. I live in a fucking dungeon, one of the half elves wants to marry and possibly fuck me, and I don’t want to even breathe the same air she exhales, lest her Catholicism and elfness infects me. Let me play hero with your team, it would benefit the world to let me work with you.”
“Blasphemy! Half-elf pussy is unparalleled… I mean…” he coughed a bit and recovered his composure. I smiled as something clicked on my mind. “We don’t hire psychopaths.”
“Kinslayer,” I pointed out and scratched my chin with disinterest.
“He applied via mail and lied on his resume.We don’t check everyone that wants to apply through Phaela.”
“And then you sent him on a suicide mission to stop me. Clever way to get rid of the undesirable.”
I shuffled My feet up to Mariana, grabbed her from the loose skin of her neck and then put my bloodied dog around my shoulders, as if she were a sword being held by the tail-handle
“I am powerful, Fernando. I am, furthermore, a menace to the world. Do you prefer me to keep playing this game of cat and mouse, to keep hiding on instanced dungeons while your associates are too scared to face me directly? Or do you prefer to let me play hero and ease the load on your tired shoulders. Furthermore, The Transempanadians are coming, and if I don’t destroy the world, they will. I offer Mariana and my cunning mind as weapons for your association to wield and save Planet from the interdimensional invaders.”
He snorted. “I can talk with Phaela and the others, but if we decide to offer you a clean slate, we don’t want it stained in the blood of the innocent by day two.”
“I can control myself butt my sword-gun is… her own case.”
“Mariana is a Golden Retriever. We know her legendary stupidity is a perpetual motion machine of collateral damage.”
“Yuppers, collienteral damage.” Mariana confirmed.
“Fine, talk with them, and when you decide to deliver the message, meet me by Mateo’s tomb, and don’t bring anyone else.” I turned and began walking away, hands behind my head “Or, Fernando…”
“Yes?”
I raised my hands, to show none of my fingers were crossed. “Send Violeta, and tell her to bring some flowers. She owes them to her daddy after poisoning him and all of his dogs. I won’t harm her. Promise.”
I was barely glancing at him over my shoulder, but I noticed him going pale.
“Don’t you dare tell her siblings, Walter!”
“And lose my bargaining chip? You know me better than that, Fer.” I walked away giggling. “Way better than that.”