Is there a Lore reason for the Okami collab? + More on Goddess Lore.

"The rising sun will purify the defiled land"

Soh can wear the Amaterasu costume.

Defeating Cursed Soh has this icon.

"The End"

See the Sun?

Now look at the level you fight Soh in.

No sun. Not until you defeat Cursed Soh.

However, this can also be an idea of Cursed Soh as the Mountain Goddess because there's a mountain and we can assume it's a symbol for the goddess.

The sun goddess exists in Kunitsu-Gami. But a name is never given to her.

"But the radiance of the sun..."

So I thought kuntisukami meant a kami created on earth but no, it's actually about what they govern and such. Gods of the earth (mountains, rivers, etc). They are the native gods of the land while the amatsukami came from heaven. A mistake on my part when I previously mentioned the concept.

They are also "spirits of ancestors and local heroes". 

The Mountain Goddess is a kunitsukami then. Soh is called a kunitsukami, in the scrolls.
Yoshiro is as well, in her promotional image. (or is the 'kunitsukami' in question Soh who is awakening from her Spirit Stone, and that's why a voice cries out through the temple?)

Kunitsukami

'The Kunitsukami receives light...a voice cries out'

Even if kunitsukami is referring to Soh in Yoshiro's image, we can assume they're all related to the Goddess because Soh is bound to Yoshiro, the Spirit Stone Maiden who has dedicated herself to the Mountain Goddess.

I thought, in my misunderstanding once again of a kunitsukami, that Cursed Soh might be an amatsukami for she governs from the heavens but I think it's not meant to be literal. I think 'from the heavens' is meant to heavily imply she's a Goddess. Or the defiled Goddess.

I'm digressing...

What is the significance of the Sun in Kunitsu Gami?

magatama and a sword

In this image, isn't she...a little bit Yoshiro and Soh? Holding a magatama and a sword? (I know they are part of the 3 sacred treasures...)

Amaterasu is said to have bit off magatama from a necklace gifted to her and blew them away, creating deities. In the center of Yoshiro's chest is a magatama.

Is she offspring of the sun goddess? The jewelry on her hand looks like the sun.

The Maiden...worships the Mountain Goddess but she herself appears to be a divine entity. Could it be that's why her sacrifice is accepted and why it must be her? On top of it being her ancestors who made the pact for the ritual.

Is the Maiden an offspring of the sun goddess who worships the mountain goddess?

This seems like a stretch. The sun goddess would be an amatsukami (governing from heaven? Cursed Soh?).
But I'll put this aside as an unlikely possibility.

If we decide Cursed Soh is an amatsukami and that Yoshiro is the offspring of one, then Cursed Soh is possibly a sun goddess and the rising sun who removed the defilement from the land is an amatsukami.

Amatsukami  and kunitsukami are supposed to be at odds with each other in myth.

What if the sun goddess was the ancestral deity of Yoshiro who sacrificed herself to remove defilement from the land and then continued to do so through her bloodline?

I don't know about that theory...unlikely, too.

12 masks containing the power of the goddess are stolen. The orbs contain the goddess's power. The talismans related to the orbs have goddess colors. The colors are...prism colors? When light passes through glass. 

We have that 'reflecting off a mirror' line from Cursed Soh's plaque.

Is it...implying refraction?

The white light breaks into 7 different colors...7 cycles...

The Sacrifice occurs in the Narusawa Wind Caves, as we get the scroll after finishing the level.

Amaterasu once fled to a cave where she hid herself from the world.

I'm genuinely curious if something is implied here. Due to the lack of lore and dialogue, things have to be pieced together from the visual story-telling.

After writing this, I decided to translate Cursed Soh's Japanese Plaque using Google, which isn't always accurate.

'mountain paper' is just a mistranslation of mountain goddess

So...is this is actually confirming it's the Mountain Goddess? And that the ancestors of the Maiden made a deal with the Goddess to sacrifice a Maiden for the ritual to cleanse the mountain of defilement so they can live there? It implies that from the very beginning, there was a ritual pact to honor the Goddess as a way to be allowed to live in the mountain after humanity had already destroyed it.

The ancestors of the villagers are called the 'gods of the mountain'. Is it using gods as in, kami/ancestors/kunitsukamis? Why are they less powerful than the Mountain Goddess?

Then it makes sense that Nanamagari's appearance takes the form of the Sacrifice Ritual. Human Sacrifice no doubt creates terrible defilement.

But then...the end of Kunitsu-Gami is indeed the birth of a new Goddess because the Mountain Goddess was purified and her powers absorbed by Soh. Powers of the 6 Maidens before her.

And once together, the 7 colors become purifying white light...

the light of the sun goddess?