Succubi

Succubi are demons associated with sexual attraction and longing, but the book treats them as a varied population rather than a single caricature. They are common in the mortal realm because they can find willing humans to summon them, blend easily into human society, and feed on the desires they provoke. Their apparent social power is therefore inseparable from their vulnerability: they depend on expectations about sexuality while being judged within Hell as lesser beings.

Nature and Presence in the Mortal Realm

The most immediate sign of a succubus may be an effect on the people around her rather than a visible supernatural display. When Maharet encounters the blue-tipped horns of a demonic barista, she identifies the worker as probably a succubus because the voice and manner have made even the name Frank sound sexy. The coffee shop is unusually full of male customers, apparently drawn by the barista’s presence, while the line moves quickly. The scene establishes the succubus’s influence as social and atmospheric: attraction reorganizes an ordinary human business without requiring open violence or a revelation of true form.

Succubi are also difficult to control once they enter the human world. Maharet considers killing the suspected intruder but rejects the idea because a demon killed on Earth would be sent back to Hell before its spark was completely extinguished, renewed by Hell’s eternal flames, and able to return seeking answers. A succubus could easily find another foolish, depraved, bored, or lonely human willing to summon her. This regenerative connection between mortal summoning and infernal return helps explain why succubi are so widespread outside Hell and why their presence cannot be solved through a simple attack.

Cherry as an Individual Succubus

Cherry provides the clearest counterpoint to the species’ conventional image. She is nearly six feet tall and possesses the expected physical markers of a succubus, but she hates physical contact. Even an embrace is deeply uncomfortable to her, and sexual intercourse is completely unacceptable. The contradiction is not treated as a temporary inconvenience; it is the central condition of her life, making the standard succubus role almost impossible for her to perform.

Instead of touching people, Cherry feeds mainly on the sexual tension and longing surrounding them. Her personal rule is effectively to allow looking but not touching, and she adopts a soft academic style, including sweaters and glasses, in an attempt to reduce her natural allure. The disguise only partly works. Rather than making her unappealing, it makes her appear both beautiful and approachable, intensifying the very response she hopes to manage. Cherry’s body, clothing, occupation, and boundaries thus remain caught in conflict with the expectations attached to her species.

Her family history deepens that conflict. Cherry’s mother, Lilah, is a succubus who moved back to Hell’s second circle after separating from Orik, an old sloth demon. Cherry does not know who her biological father is, and Lilah claims to have been too drunk to remember. The family’s instability includes scandal, resentment, and the threat of punishment: Cherry believes Maharet’s arrival may result in her being dragged back to the second circle and grounded for a thousand years. She hates Hell and regards her older siblings as lazy, while the separation of her parents has left the family tense; she also believes she contributed to her father’s departure.

Gendered Hierarchy and Social Judgment

Cherry explicitly identifies patriarchy as one reason succubi are considered lesser demons, arguing that Hell remains male-dominated even under Lucy’s leadership. Her explanation turns the species’ supposed weakness into a political classification. Succubi are not merely measured by supernatural ability; they are ranked within a culture that devalues the forms of power associated with them and expects them to serve through sexuality.

Cherry’s own treatment illustrates the cost of that hierarchy. She describes herself as useless, a joke, and an embarrassment in the eyes of her family, while her mother keeps her locked up. Titan challenges that self-assessment rather than accepting it as an objective description. His uncertainty about whether to return her as a lost soul and escaped demon or find another way for her to serve Hell creates the possibility that her value might not depend on conforming to the customary succubus function.

The contrast between Cherry and the general reputation of succubi is therefore structurally important. Their social identity is built around seduction, but Cherry’s refusal of touch prevents her from occupying that identity in its expected form. Her predicament shows how a category can appear powerful from outside while operating as a constraint from within: the same beauty and allure that attract customers and make succubi effective in the mortal realm become evidence used against Cherry when she cannot or will not turn them into sexual access.

Relations with Other Supernatural Beings

Succubi occupy an uneasy position in the broader infernal order. Maharet is powerful enough to confront a mere succubus, yet she is wary of the encounter because Bael’s higher rank and her own relationship with him could produce gossip, endanger Six, and damage her carefully maintained reputation. The concern is not only physical conflict but the social consequences of being seen together. Succubi are mobile, hard to contain, and capable of blending into human communities, so one who notices the disguised family might eventually discover their presence on Earth.

The species also appears against the background of larger supernatural identities. Bael recalls having coworkers, fellow warriors, and former lovers but almost no friends, while his closest friendship is connected to Six rather than to any infernal social category. Elsewhere, Maharet reveals that she is a fallen angel, and Bael accepts that history without treating it as a revelation. These contrasts emphasize that Hell and Heaven classify beings through rank, origin, and function, while individual relationships repeatedly cross those boundaries. Succubi are judged as a group, but the narrative keeps returning to the question of what a particular demon can become beyond the assigned category.

Narrative Significance

Succubi embody the book’s recurring tension between imposed identity and chosen belonging. They are created and recognized through a powerful stereotype, yet Cherry demonstrates that the stereotype cannot contain every member of the species. Her aversion to touch, reliance on ambient longing, academic presentation, and fear of familial punishment make her conflict concrete rather than abstract.

Through Cherry, the species also connects bodily autonomy to infernal politics. A succubus may be expected to generate desire, but that expectation does not grant others the right to touch her or define her usefulness. The mortal realm offers succubi freedom to blend in and survive, while Hell supplies the hierarchy that labels them lesser. Their position is consequently double-edged: they possess a form of influence that humans readily respond to, yet that influence is treated as proof that they belong beneath other demons. The book’s treatment of Succubi becomes most revealing precisely where the category fails—when Cherry cannot live according to the role everyone assumes her body has assigned her.