Succubus
Layla had originally been a man of modern South Korea.
Lying on the narrow bed of a goshiwon—one of those cramped one-room lodgings—he felt a strange certainty settle over him in the instant before his eyes closed.
Ah. This time, I'm not getting back up.
The premonition did not fail him. When she opened her eyes again, the world was something else entirely—the Demon Realm—and she had been born a succubus.
She had assumed this life would be like the last, spent alone and without a family. Fortunately, a family was there after all: one sharp-tempered succubus sister, and one indifferent incubus brother. Whether that truly counted as fortunate was another matter.
Perhaps it was because her memories of being human remained far too vivid. Layla had been indecisive and timid in her past life as well, and even at ten—even at fifteen—she still could not adapt to the Demon Realm. When her sister sneered at her, she bowed her head. When the scolding dragged on, she bowed it lower still.
"Haah, Layla. Where in the world did something like you come from?"
Arms folded, her sister looked down at her, one corner of her mouth crooked upward.
"You're reluctant to absorb a man's life essence? A succubus? You're not a child. How long do you intend to keep this up? You're dragging our honor through the dirt."
"I'm sorry..."
In truth, Layla had only said she couldn't do it when she was very young—a timid little confession she had let slip in the faint hope of being told it was all right. Her sister had been wringing years of scoldings out of that single remark. She couldn't even call it unfair. A shred of that old reluctance still lingered, and so she had no answer to give.
Her brother was not so different. He didn't harangue her outright the way her sister did, but the look in his eyes—pure, unimpressed disdain—was exactly the same.
Even so, time moved on, and the human sensibilities she had carried wore away little by little until they were gone.
Bat wings sprouted from her shoulder blades, and a slender tail hung from the base of her spine. At first they had made her flinch every time she faced a mirror, hopelessly unfamiliar. Now, when she stretched in the morning, her wings stretched with her, and on days when her mood was light her tail swayed of its own accord.
It was long overdue, but the time had come to accept what she was: a succubus, and one of the demon race.
Then came her twentieth year, the day she became an adult. At the dining table, Layla stood before her sister and brother, lifted the head she had always kept bowed, and held her tail straight and proud.
"I'll absorb a man's life essence."
Her sister's utensils clattered onto the table.