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Blacktop and Company
Blacktop (Gael Gonzalez)
A veteran agent of the Firm and The Hero (though he wholly disagrees with that distinction). He's very good at his job and is loved Dirge City's populace for it. But in the story proper, he's seen by his fellow agents as "soft" for sparing the daemons he's supposed to vanquish. He does this because the lack of daemon activity in the city's caused him to lose the drive he once had. Thus, he no longer sees the point in his job and wants something more interesting to happen. But as the saying goes, Be Careful What You Wish For...
Gael has the uncanny ability to sprout black tendrils from his palms, which he uses to bind his opponents. He has this ability because he's a "Branded", but what exactly this means is currently unknown.
- Dark Is Not Evil: A towering man decked out in dark clothing that can sprout black tendrils from his palms, but is very much on the side of good and understanding enough to spare some of the daemons he corners.
- Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: In a relationship with Bunka, who's half his size.
- Naughty Tentacles: It's obvious from how the scene around the end of the second chapter is worded and described that, when he's not using them for fighting, Blacktop uses his Tendrils of Darkness for... other things.
- Tendrils of Darkness: His primary ability, which he can sprout from his palms. He uses them mostly to bind daemons with, but he can also use them to squeeze daemons he binds until their bones break. They're also sharp enough to cut through almost anything. They do have one major weakness, however: since the vines are part of his body (and very sensitive parts of his body), if they're stabbed or bitten, they'll cause Gael great pain, which the red-haired schoolgirl exploits during her struggle with him to escape from him.
Bunka (Luciana Navarro)
A rookie agent of the Firm and Gael's girlfriend. Though diminutive and soft-spoken, she curses like a sailor and doesn't take any crap. She sympathizes with Gael and his disillusionment with his work, and does her best to cheer him up.
- Abusive Parents: Perhaps, considering she refers to (who's presumed to be) her mother as a "bitch" and apparently chose to stay at Blacktop's place to avoid her.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Downplayed. She's pretty fierce despite her small stature, but she's still quite pleasant to be around.
- Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: In a relationship with Blacktop, who effortlessly dwarfs her.
Fuse (Cory Sanders)
Lotus (Ming Yue)
Curveball (Jacob Ortiz)
The Firm
In General
A worldwide organization dedicated to protecting humanity from the daemon menace. As the story proper focuses mainly on the branch situated in Dirge City, the tropes below are mostly focused on that same branch.
- Home Base: The Barguest Building, a high-rise that looms over all of Dirge City.
- Mystical 108: The Barguest Building has exactly 108 stories. Xiomara's office is on the 108th, and she's very proud of that fact.
Leadership
Commander
Queen Xi (Xiomara Sánchez)
The commander of Dirge City's branch of the Firm, who's exasperated with Gael for "making a habit" of sparing daemons.
- Anime Hair: Her hair's described as being big and fiery-looking, and it gets even bigger when she enters her Super Mode.
- Bad Boss: Gael's pretty much fed up with her and Bunka has no qualms insulting her behind her back. It's also implied the agents of the Firm in general are also pretty annoyed with the way she runs things.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Perfectly willing to crush Blacktop's balls with her foot for sparing a daemon that wasn't even hurting anyone.
- Shout-Out: She's got a Super Mode that's triggered by anger and signified by her long, spiky hair getting even longer and spiker.
- Silver Vixen: She's an older female with a shapely figure who wears a tight suit that accentuates her... features.
- Super Mode: Whenever she's angry enough, she enters a state where her Anime Hair grows and she gets exponentially stronger. Though it's obviously a fighting ability first and foremost, she apparently uses it to intimidate agents who fail her, if the way she used it to intimidate Blacktop's any indication. Unfortunately for her, he's too used to this tactic to be fazed by it.
Co-commanders
Agents
Veterans
Redcap (Frederick Edmundson)
Intermediates
Novices
Dirge City
In General
- Apathetic Citizens: The place is undoubtedly daemon-infested, but the citizenry don't let it faze them since their branch of the Firm's great at what they do.
- Wretched Hive: Downplayed. It's as bustling, grimy, and crime-ridden as you'd expect a densely populated city to be, with the fantastical element that is the daemons just adding to the wretchedness. That stated, the Firm alone manage to make coexistence with the daemons somewhat possible, even if there are some that're unabashedly vile.
Esteban
A bearded, cigar-smoking man the schoolgirl encounters during Blackout Time.
- Ambiguously Human: He's described as looking like a regular human and is never outright stated to be a daemon in disguise, but he does possess supernatural abilities, if the way he uses smoke to vanish from the streets with the schoolgirl is anything to go by.
- Ambiguous Situation: Both how he's got smoke powers despite being a regular human and how he and the schoolgirl know each other are anyone's guess.
- Smoking Is Cool: He's a scruffy-looking man who appears before the schoolgirl smoking a cigar, and uses the smoke from it to spirit her and himself away before any agents come across them.
- Super Smoke: He has the ability to manipulate smoke, using a cloud of it to vanish from the streets with the schoolgirl.
Nancy
The landlord of 395 Mara Avenue, the apartment complex where Blacktop lives. She dislikes daemons due to them constantly coming into her building and bothering her tenants, and usually looks to Blacktop to sort these disturbances out, much to his chagrin.
- Lovable Alpha Bitch: She's quite the nag and obviously has prejudice against daemons, but she's got a big enough heart that she's allowed the three Bocas she originally wanted gone to stay inside the complex... so long as they don't bother anyone, that is.
Disheveled blonde
A blonde woman in a tattered, bloodstained dress the schoolgirl finds drawing a "Convo Circle" at the end of an alleyway.
- Blood Is the New Black: Wears a ripped purple dress covered in blood and is certainly dangerous.
- Fan Disservice: She's a young woman with long blonde hair... and deathly pale skin. And bags under her eyes. And wearing a tattered, dirt-covered, blood-stained dress.
- Gonk: Quite unsightly compared to the other female characters introduced so far if the above description of her is any indication.
- Nothing Is Scarier: One can only imagine whose blood is on her dress, let alone how it got on her dress.
- Things Man Was Not Meant to Know: She knows enough about the Language of the Daemons—something human beings are prohibited from knowing—to draw a functional Convo Circle.
Daemons
In General
The main antagonistic force in the series. Daemons are supernatural creatures that've been a menace to humanity for centuries, and it's the Firm's job to subdue and detain any and all daemons that threaten innocent humans.
- Always Chaotic Evil: Played with. The narrative and certain characters speak of daemons like this, as there are obviously bad apples and the worldwide agency that is the Firm exists for a reason. However, not all of them are bad, to the point where the narrative states that some daemons roam about Dirge City completely undisguised, and even agents like Blacktop spare those they're tasked with going after if they confirm that they're not malicious.
The Blancs
In General
Leadership
Whitefly (Bianca Eiximenis)
Dover
Significant Operatives
Eider
Individuals
Redheaded schoolgirl
A young girl who's a fan of Blacktop's. She's actually a daemon known as a "Roji" disguised as a girl, and has the honor of being Blacktop's first target in the story proper.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Deliberately made her disguise as innocent-looking as possible. Too bad nobody bothered to tell her how Blacktop's powers work...
- Cruel Mercy: Downplayed. Blacktop lets her go because he didn't really care to go on the mission to capture her, leaving her with the warning she must behave if she wants to stay in the city.
- Oh, Crap!: Momentarily loses her cool when Blacktop shows her his palm. What exactly freaked her out isn't revealed, but when she encounters the cigar smoker, she asks him why nobody told her Blacktop's a "Branded".
- Reluctant Monster: A daemon through and through, but isn't out to harm anyone and just wants to play with the kids in the city. She even saw her encounter with Gael as more of a game than a fight.
- Starter Villain: More or less existed to give the reader a demonstration of Blacktop's powers. It's even hinted by the way their fight goes that Blacktop could've killed her at anytime, but chose to hold back to get some form of challenge from her.
Species
Bocas
Bald, diminutive, sharp-toothed creatures, Bocas are universally considered to be the most harmless daemon species.
- Friendly Enemy: They're daemons, but they're harmless and undeniably cute to the point where even Xiomara doesn't see them as a threat.
Glee-Moths
Rojis
