was wondering about some of the earlier chapters in the book when we first learn about them, like when Raki's brother turns out to have been eaten by a yoma in disguise

these later chapters seem to indicate they start out as regular people, but the earlier one's suggest their some kind of shape shifting demons (for instance how the yoma claims that the body of Raki's brother was crying for him), was wondering if n e 1 had thoughts

Yoma I believe are shape shifting demons. Most of the monsters you see now in the book are awaken beings.

some can shape shift, others posess live human bodies or even corpses

thus are most likely regular peeps

i think awakened beings are just a stronger version of yoma and each different creature actually has its own special ability. all yoma and awakened beings used to be both male and female claymores. there are more weak male ones because i guess the organization didnt develop a system of execution back then and they all became rampant.
all of them are able to mimic human form and i think that the yoma who ate raki's brother is a special case since yoma usually just ate guts. since no body was found, you could probably assume the yoma ate the entire body and that's why as the yoma was mimicking raki's brother, raki's brother was crying.