NOVEL SIMPLE Ch 2 – It’s like that nightmare where you’re naked in school as a girl but with the worst hangover and… Wait, am I a demon now?
The cool, flat surface below pressed into me with unyielding indifference. My body felt feverish—on fire, yet cold. I shivered, and the bones beneath my pained muscles ached, begging for relief. For an end. Numb fingers stretched out across the rough, uncaring floor, searching.
I could hear voices, though I struggled to make sense of them. I could feel their anger—their outrage—like a flowing tide around me.
My father towered above. I knew his face would appear passive. Hiding the glare, the sneers, the disappointment just underneath.
“I said, get up,” he snarled, as he’d done thousands of times now through the years of training.
We weren’t done yet. I had to get up. But I was too tired. I couldn’t.
His boot slammed into my chest, and I curled inward on my side with a groan. Training wasn’t over. I had to get up. Prove that I was worthy. I had to…
Things faded once again, trailing off into nothingness, before my mind resurfaced from unconsciousness some indeterminable amount of time after. Had it been days? Minutes? Everything still hurt, and I could tell I was close to drifting back. My eyes blinked, struggling to open. Breath shuddered deep into my lungs, bringing with it the thick scent of sweat and old, spoiled liquor. My nose crinkled in response.
I could feel my body swaying, and as my vision slowly cleared, a man’s face formed above me. My thoughts were slow to come, as though my mind was wading through a sludge-filled swamp. The man looked down, and my head churned until I connected his face with the demonologist professor, Kheln, grinning down at me with a sly smile. What was going on?
His eyes, I noticed, held a dark, mischievous glint. “Awake now? There’s so many things I want to know. Alas, I doubt I’ll be given the chance to pry them out of you.”
For a moment, I stared back, confused, only to notice that the ceiling above him was moving.
He… was carrying me? I could feel the pressure of his arm against my back and below my legs. With some effort, I twisted my expression into a scowl.
Words of protest spilled from my lips, but in my delirious state, it came out in a terribly high-pitched voice as, “Hafvv ut—ownnn.” Something was very obviously wrong with me, I realized. Had I been drugged? I let out a rather undignified growl of frustration and began flailing and squirming against the dark blanket I was in. It wasn’t my most flattering or respectable look, I’d be the first to admit. But why was I being carried in someone’s arms like some damsel??
The man let out a snort, and a moment after, I was falling, my face smacking down against the floor. I let out a pained groan and squirmed to get up, failing completely. It was somehow only then that I noticed that my wrists were bound together by something, and I could feel the unyielding pressure of metal around them. Frowning, I tossed the blanket fully off of me, and brought my hands up, only to freeze in place.
Around my wrists were thick steel shackles, weld together, rather than connected by loose chains.
But that was not why I stared, frozen in horror.
The skin along my arms was not the tanned brown that I was used to, but red. For a moment, fear struck me, terrified that I was looking at the flesh of a corpse, skinned and raw.
“Come on, come on. If you’re gonna walk, then start walking,” Kheln insisted in his low, airy voice. Above me, the man’s eyes appeared, alight with wild magic.
He reached down, grabbing me by the hair and yanking me up to my feet, before shoving me forward down the hall. I stumbled, and would have fallen back to the floor if not for the wall to my right. The shackles clanged against the tiled bricks along with my shoulder, and I held my weight against them for a moment before Kheln insistently nudged me forward once more, a hand pressing against my back. He was in a hurry, forcing me to move at a brisk pace, despite how uncoordinated I felt. What happened to me? Had I become some undead, soulless creature? And what exactly was happening now?
I could feel the man’s hand against my bare back and the cool air flowing against my naked flesh as we walked at a pace that I found difficult to keep. The open air across my body took a moment to fully register in my mind, the realization that I was walking the halls in the nude finally hitting me. My gaze trailed back downward as I struggled to keep my feet beneath me. Crimson red skin stared back, engulfing me. My entirely bare body, I remembered. As my eyes refocused, they found my chest. A proper, full chest.
With breasts.
What? I blinked, my mind momentarily paralyzed in pure bewilderment. Somehow, I continued to wobble forth, my legs threatening to give out beneath me. A torrent of fear overwhelmed the lingering horror of before over what was happening, pursued by a flash of anger at whoever was responsible for this mockery—my suspicion landing directly on the man at my back. Mixed emotions flooded through me, as though fighting for dominance, entirely unfiltered and undecipherable. Terror, rage, suspicion, anguish, and strangest of all, somewhere from deep in my chest, an almost hopeful hunger, or perhaps… yearning?
I shuddered, stumbling over my feet. Bound arms rose in front of me, and I winced as the shackle slammed into the floor, making my wrists throb in burning pain. Old instincts had my knees shifting up beneath me, and quickly lifting me back to my feet. My vision blurred, and I swayed, yet my mind kept spinning onward.
This wasn’t my body, that much was obvious. Had I been—
“Alright, enough of that,” the demonologist grumbled. Part of my mind expected him to attack, and I braced myself for the blow. Instead, he grabbed me, lifting me off my feet and twirling my body around with surprising ease until I was in his arms like before.
“W-wha—” I tried to respond, only to stumble completely on the foreign voice that came out.
“The provost is already going to be annoyed as it is. I’m carrying you, and if I hear any complaints, I will place a silencing glyph on you. Understand, demon?”
Demon. The word rang in my mind like an echoing bell-tower. A moment passed, and then I remembered. The events flashed through my mind in quick succession: the failed summoning, the demonic voice, and the strange magical backlash just before I lost consciousness and my life. Or so I’d thought.
I’d… survived? I stared down at the strange creature I’d become. By some definitions of ‘survived’, I supposed.
Professor Kheln didn’t bother to wait for my response, strutting forth at an impatient pace. Normally, I’d complain, completely appalled at being treated in such a way. But I admittedly had much bigger concerns to fret over. Even the stench of alcohol on his shirt wasn’t enough to grab my attention.
My gaze trailed down back over my body, or this body, lingering briefly on the strange sight of my bare chest before moving further down. The breasts weren’t the only thing that was different. Once more, my emotions swirled, full of feelings that I wasn’t sure how to make sense of. Was I even still myself? How would I even know if my mind had been affected as well?
The demonologist turned a corner, and I realized with a start exactly where we were heading by the large, elaborately decorated, bronze door just ahead.
I could feel my face pale before filling back with color at the realization that I was about to be in front of a lot of people looking like this. Dear gods, strike me down here.
“D-don’t you have something for me to w-wear?” Despite my strange voice, I managed to make it through the entire sentence. I needed to get past this. Weaknesses were something to be exploited. My gaze flickered between his face and the impending door. “Surely you don’t expect—”
“Did I not just say to be silent? You gave up your modesty when you tossed the blanket to the side. Besides, you’re a succubus,” he stated, eyeing my body, the implications left unsaid.
My anger flared. Why was I letting him treat me this way at all? Shackled hands clenched into tight fists as my eyes narrowed on the man. This was no time to be suffering from shock. Who cared if my body was different for the moment—I was still Gellin Zelian, scion to one of the Great Families! I pushed aside all the emotions, thoughts, and worries that had occupied my mind for the last several minutes. Had I completely lost my mind? No man or woman could lay so much as a finger on me, lest they lose it. To think that I was allowing this complete joke of a professor to carry me NAKED through the academy! Professor Kheln would live to regret this day, of that I would make certain. Finally arriving back at my senses, my muscles tightened, prepared to move.
I didn’t have any weapons on me, which significantly lowered my combat capabilities. Unfortunate, considering that I doubted the demonologist could best me at this range with a dagger in hand. Still, I could feel a well of magic within me, a surprisingly large pool of warmth instead of the light, airy sensation that I was used to. It was different, but I hoped it would serve me just the same.
With a sneering glare, I did my best to gather the mana through my arms and to my hands, before growling, “I’d advise you to put me down this instant if you wish to make it to the end of the day with your head still atop your shoulders.” The professor sighed, and I prepared to hit him with the thick shackles around my wrists as I hissed out, “Do you have any idea at all who I am? I’ll—”
His arm slipped from beneath my legs, and I paused, preparing myself to fall, before his other arm simply adjusted itself beneath me, somehow still holding my weight. Did he have some kind of glyph that was boosting his strength or—
Before I could even finish the thought, his other hand swirled up, clutched around something. I swung my arms, striking him swiftly on the nose with a lot less force than I’d hoped for. This time, I did fall, as the man reeled back, stumbling and almost losing his footing. I rolled as I landed, quickly getting back to my feet, despite being physically bound. It truthfully wasn’t really different from rolling while holding a weapon, something I was well practiced at. The stunt made one thing quite clear to me, though. My body was weakened. I peeked down at the muscles along my arms. Beyond the smooth crimson coloring, they didn’t seem particularly different from before. Though how often did I take time to make note of their distinct appearance?
I looked back to the professor, who was now glaring my way, his nose dripping blood from between his fingers. Perhaps I had lost a bit of strength. The spell had taken a lot out of me, likely draining my physically to do all that it had to my body. I was clearly fatigued, and honestly, lucky to be alive. Though if I was honest, I’d been through worse experiences. A little fatigue was nothing.
The transformation was… strange, to put it simply. But I’d get through it, find a way to change back, and then develop a new plan to survive and thrive within this school of sharks and fools. It would be challenging, especially considering word of what happened would assuredly spread. But I was a Zelian.
I stood tall, despite my nudity. My pride wouldn’t shatter from something as minor as embarrassment. My tail flickered in annoyance. My tail… I had a tail. I stared at the sleek red appendage as it circled around and into view, thicker near the base, but coming up to a smooth point along the end. It was nearly as long as I was tall and felt so strangely natural that I’d somehow missed it up till now. Something else to figure out later.
“Alright, I deserved that,” Professor Kheln muttered, rubbing his face.
“I am Gellin Zelian,” I announced, “and I demand you procure some clothing for me. If I am to attend an assembly within the academy chamber, then I will do so clothed. Not dragged in like some stray dog.” I glared, staring the man down, despite my lacking height. That was one thing that hadn’t seemed to change, for better or worse. I’d always been a little on the shorter side. Couldn’t becoming a demon at least have made me a bit taller? It was just my luck that I’d become something as ridiculous as a succubus.
The demonologist shook his head as he stared momentarily at the ground, muttering something under his breath. I realized a moment too late, that it wasn’t mere grumbling over his bloodied nose.
My feet jumped back as the man smashed a glyph stone against the old wooden floor. Magic sparked and brightened around him before bolting through the wood and up into me like an arc of lightning. I had barely a second to stumble backwards before the magic surged painfully through my body, and I shouted out in an embarrassingly high-pitched squeal. In response, I tried to pull together my own internal magical resistances, simple spells I’d practiced numerous times in the past, only to find my mana unresponsive. As the foreign mana took its course through me, muscles froze, becoming unresponsive. Then, as though to mock me, another spell followed, and multiple chains flowed up from the surrounding floor. A surprised hiccup slipped out of me as they glided across naked—and surprisingly sensitive—skin like smooth silk, slowly tightening. I couldn’t consciously move, but that didn’t stop my body from twitching in aversion to the unexpected sensation. My eyes clenched shut as they encircled me, squeezing around my chest in what was a very novel experience for me. My balance faltered, and once more, I tumbled down to the floor with significantly less grace than before.
I took in several deep breaths, trying to steady my thoughts and frantic heartbeat. While most of my muscles were unresponsive, at least the vitals seemed to work. I could breathe and was still conscious.
The newfound sensitivity of my skin had caught me completely off guard. Were this done by someone I was into, it might have left me writhing in heat, as embarrassing as that was to admit. That it was Professor Kheln’s doing was like a bucket of ice water that left me feeling nauseous more than anything.
Had the chain’s movement been intentionally slow and sensuous, or did it only feel so due to my nudity and unfamiliar body? Perhaps the truth was somewhere in the middle, though Kheln struck me as the sort of man to be somewhat of a perverted creep.
Asshole.
I bet he designed the spell to do exactly that. My eyes blinked open to level a malicious glare toward his boots as they stepped into sight. Somehow, I’d make him regret this. All of it.
“Underestimating a succubus. I must be losing my touch,” he said.
Was he going to completely ignore what I’d said before? Did he not believe me, or was it possible that he already knew?
I opened my mouth to ask the man if he was deaf, only to find that I couldn’t. Damned paralysis. Should have expected him to have something like this up his sleeve. I pulled at the magic in my body, but no matter how much I tried, I couldn’t bend it to my will at all, thanks to that nasty little spell.
Unable to speak, move, or cast, all I could do was glare at the man’s rugged boots. As much as I hated to admit it, that was likely for the best. I had little hope of crushing the bastard in my current state. Better to bide my time and devise something much more comprehensive, secretive, and vicious. Something that wouldn’t immediately bite me in the ass.
“You may have a point, though. As entertaining as it would be, some of the other professors are bound to make a fuss if I bring you in without a strip of fabric on you.”
Already, I could feel the paralysis in my body beginning to fade, and I wasn’t sure if it was a limit of the spell or a quirk of my newly demonic nature. My head tilted just enough to bring the fool professor’s face into view as he stroked his beard, his nose already back to normal, at least in appearance. His eyes met my own, and I watched as an idea seemed to click from within.
