Spirit Stone Maidens: Normal ending Soh vs True Ending Soh.

In many of my old posts, I'm always asking:

Why does Soh poof into white light in the normal ending but in the true ending, she turns into her spirit state and disappears into the heavens?

It finally dawned on me the obvious: the normal ending takes place within Yoshiro.

It's even shown directly.
(God, grant me better eyes so I may stop humiliating myself)

The Soh she meets is the piece of the Goddess she held within her.

Now that her duty is done, Soh leaves Yoshiro's body.(?)

If Soh's spirit that resided within the former Spirit Stone Maiden is returned to her after Yoshiro absorbs Nanamagari(both the defilement and the spirit in its belly) then the glowing Soh in the normal ending is the glowing Soh in the true ending because Soh regains her full powers as the Goddess in both.
(But why nullify the pact in the latter?)

The True Ending occurs because Soh's spirit becomes cursed from the defiled body it's been housed in. The Goddess spirit mixing with the Maiden's putrid body.
Soh's mask contains the pattern of impurity and it is her mask that remains with the Maiden inside her spirit stone.
(Is this what the director meant when he said Soh's mask represents her relationship to the Maidens?)

But this means a piece of the Goddess remains in the crystallized body of the Maiden for there to be remnants of Her power in the spirit stone.

So why does Soh poof away in the normal ending? Doesn't the spirit of the Maiden and Goddess remain together, inside her body?

Or is leaving her mask with Yoshiro meant to be leaving some of her spirit behind?

In the opening, Yoshiro is praying to the spirit stone. We know she prays to ancestral spirits, so is she praying to her ancestor, the Maiden, or is she praying to the Goddess inside? Or both?

Yoshiro comes from a long line of Maidens such as herself, according to Soh's Japanese bio:
(this is a mistranslation. Although it is stated in her plaque that Yoshiro's family made the pact so it's technically true. Google translated Yoshiro's name as the 'long line of maidens'. But maybe it's also a bit of wordplay on her name...?)

本作の主人公であり、山の巫女「世代」の護人。村人たちと協力し、自らも刀を取って巫女を護りぬく。

She is the protagonist of this story and the guardian of the mountain shrine maiden, who belongs to a long line of such maidens. She cooperates with the villagers and takes up a sword herself to protect the shrine maiden.

Yoshiro's:

穢れ祓いの力を宿した山の巫女。穢れに覆われた村々を救うために宗と共に各所を巡る。その力が原因で、人々を脅かす存在である「畏哭」に狙われている。

A mountain shrine maiden possessing the power to purify corruption. She travels with So, visiting various villages to save them from being overwhelmed by corruption. Because of her power, she is targeted by "Ikoku," a being that threatens humanity.

It specifies that Soh took up a sword herself. Does it have meaning for it to be phrased that way? Perhaps t's about Soh descending to help?

The normal ending has people praying to Yoshiro the same way she prayed to the stone. Is this meant to show how the lines blur and the Goddess and Maiden become intertwined through worship?

Then again, she's housing the Goddess so praying to her is fine.

To rehash: 

A Spirit Stone Maiden is a girl who becomes crystallized after purifying the mountain using her body, and then her crystallized body continues to serve as a yorishiro for the Goddess, warding off calamity and misfortune. Because this crystal also houses defilement which accumulates through generations, the influx of impurity in the 7th stone defiled the Goddess.

I made a post claiming Yoshiro was and is and will be Soh's Spirit Stone.

Now I realize it becomes more sensible if I replace 'Spirit Stone' with 'yorishiro'. Or just abode, as I've always called her.

The Maiden serves as an abode until the next time calamity hits. This means she's still housing the Goddess even when she's a spirit stone. This is how the Goddess becoming mixed with impurity occurred. Her vessel was tainted, always. For 8 cycles, including ours.

When the game starts, it starts with Yoshiro activating her powers as an abode, and allowing Soh to occupy physical space in the world. Soh can no longer manifest once the spirit stone is taken and so Yoshiro is the next abode.
(Why does she appear so far from Yoshiro?)

Yoshiro is the 'body of the goddess'. The Spirit Stone Maiden. Her destiny is to become the next Spirit Stone.

In the Normal Ending, we see Soh watching a Maiden, which made me think this Maiden was already an abode. Instead, it's more likely that Soh is still tethered to our Yoshiro. Only when the spirit stone is stolen by Seethe for the Goddess power within it, does Soh need a new abode.

(Speaking of stolen power and stolen masks, when Nanamagari stole the Spirit Stone, did it steal the mask of the Goddess that was given to/left with the Maiden? Is this why Nanamagari wears a bastardized version of the Goddess's mask in its first phase? Or did it steal the power, but the power is symbolized as the mask?)

As for the True Ending, I believe Soh turns into a spirit because Yoshiro is no longer an abode.
As she departs, she says something about the mask. Maybe that she's taking it back, if the mask symbolizes a portion of her power?

Is Yoshiro holding the mask within her? Who can really say...but she certainly is in the normal ending.

This nullifies quite a bit of what I've previous said, I think...

The story is quite simple, isn't it? 

The Messenger of the Goddess is the Goddess that's manifest when she uses a yorishiro.

A cursed yorishiro produces a cursed messenger. And when said yorishiro has 'merged' with the Goddess, its form is alike a sum of its parts.

But the mirror part of Cursed Soh's plaque is still mysterious to me.

This represents the normal ending. We receive it when Yoshiro is nearly completely stone.

What battle? Against impurity? But it's a part of life.

Or is the battle against Cursed Soh actually occurring multiple times?

(I have many unpublished posts and in one, I thought the circles on Yoshiro's head were related to her becoming an abode. Rather than it being fashion lol. I have come a long way with theories. It's impressive, the leaps I have made in the past.)

Remember someone calling Yoshiro a Living Buddha? Crystallized alive...

Soul Division.

 The Tsuba Guard Kijin's specter shows Soh can divide her soul.

The created spirit uses the same model as the dark Cursed Soh.

(In the files, they are (basically)the same model)

Spot the difference(the little flap one is Soh's spectre. Why? Who knows)

When the Goddess possess Yoshiro, she splits her soul and puts a piece of her inside the Maiden.

For the Ritual, the Goddess possesses a Maiden, enabling the Maiden to use her purifying power. Overtime, it caused her spirit to become cursed because of the Maiden also doubling as a katashiro. The Maiden absorbs defilement, affecting her body and eventually the spirit within. But it's only a piece of the Goddess, this is why we have Soh and Cursed Soh.

It's all because of the Goddess dividing her soul.

Cursed Soh is the Goddess. Soh is the Goddess.
Cursed Soh has the halo. Not Soh.

Yoshiro is also drawn with a halo and she has the ability to affect Cursed Soh's power. Yoshiro, too, is a vessel for the Goddess. Just like Cursed Soh is.

The vessel of the Goddess is drawn with the halo because that's where she actually resides. The Messenger is but a physical manifestation of her.

The Goddess is present in both Yoshiro and the corrupted body of the previous Maiden.

Soh is the Goddess given physical form through Yoshiro serving as an abode.

Cursed Soh is a version of Soh that materializes when the vessel is defiled/extremely impure.

But in Cursed Soh's case, she's merged with her vessel. This is why it says Cursed Soh is the Goddess who's become 'twisted with the impurities of the people' and why she has a halo.

If we consider artwork showing the Maiden physically changes upon becoming an abode, then we can assume in Cursed Soh's case, the opposite occurred: the vessel changed the spirit.

If the Normal Ending broke the cycle, we can speculate it's because:

Soh left her mask with Yoshiro, causing Cursed Soh because the two merged.
After several generations, the impurity is so potent within the 7th Maiden's body that the Goddess becomes cursed.

(I use abode=yorishiro)

Soh's physical form. (Astral projecting and 魂魄)

As you play Kunitsu-Gami, it becomes clear no one can see Soh except Yoshiro.
At times, even she seems unable to see Soh.
(Listening to Soh + seeing Spirits, Spooking the Maiden)

The villagers can't see her, even when wearing their masks. (Spirited Away)

Some videos of poltergeist activity as Soh:

Terrorizing the villagers as a poltergeist. (the last clip is when I discovered they get spooked by this lol) #Kunitsu_Gami #祇 #くにつがみ pic.twitter.com/tqYsWC5Ev4

— Amaria💮 (@eternalnascency) July 25, 2025

hehehe...suffer!!!

Proper footage showing they can't see Soh:

The villagers being unable to see Soh(and getting spooked by breaking pots). They can 'sense' Soh though.
When sundown approaches, they will no longer get spooked.#Kunitsu_Gami #祇 #くにつがみ pic.twitter.com/YVuQHLywv5

— Amaria💮 (@eternalnascency) July 28, 2025

Even Yoshiro is spooked by Soh:

Yoshiro is the same! pic.twitter.com/IgW7bCixt7

— Amaria💮 (@eternalnascency) July 28, 2025

As sundown approaches however, the villagers are no longer spooked by Soh.(At the end of the villager video, it's sundown)
Does the world plunge into the 'other' world at night? 

Yoshiro can also see Soh at night, as she will sing to Soh.

Yoshiro's vocals are her actually singing when you stand by her. She'll stop dancing to sing if you're close enough. It looks like she's actually meant to be singing specifically for Soh. #Kunitsu_Gami#くにつがみ pic.twitter.com/xysweqV0zI

— Amaria💮 (@eternalnascency) January 20, 2025

She looks at Soh a few times in the tent but at other times, it's as if she can't see where Soh is. Perhaps this is why our cursor is a little spirit flame?

To me, it doesn't seem like Soh has a physical body. Her inhuman abilities make it very clear, too. Teleportation, turning into a spirit, etc.

The gender-neutral way of referring to her is one of the reasons why I suspect she has no real body as sex is related to your physical body.
(But she's called 'gozen' in a painting, confirming she's female/a woman. So maybe it was meant to be a surprise? Her body is obviously female. Yes, Soh is a woman.)

But if she has no physical body, how does she touch the tent?

She can break pots with her sword and operate levers with her sword. It seems her body can't interact with it physically?

Rations heal her and villagers, but how does she eat without a body?

(the rations might not even be food. I wonder if they are 'gratitude'? They are offerings, after all.)

Why can't Yoshiro be healed with rations?

Is it because although the offerings are given to Yoshiro, the villagers believe Yoshiro is one with the Goddess and so the offerings are for Soh? Soh can use them on the villagers because the masks belong to the Goddess and so the offerings will work on them.

 a ration

Using a Ration

She never touches Yoshiro directly but she has the instinct to.

When Yoshiro is unwell, she has no body.

But dying in combat leaves a body.

you can see I was wrong about impurity coming out of her mask

When she returns, she returns the exact same way she did in the prologue: a shooting pillar of light.

Descending

This means Soh remains by Yoshiro's side all the time, without a body? Then is granted one when it's needed.

Here the Messenger watches over the next Maiden with a body:

There's a flower-shaped light on Soh, reminiscent of the kaleidoscope.

She can also 'die' by falling into the water. 

Whenever Soh loses her health, it's because her power has been temporarily depleted or stolen.
(The Seethe steal power and strike with defilement/impurity when they attack. Soh has automatic healing.)

Yoshiro's power being stolen by the Seethe: confirmed in game + we play as the Goddess.
Strange symbols and patterns on the Torii Gates,

When Soh uses her Butterfly Shot ability to teleport, she appears in a flurry of pink butterflies, much like the ones that surround Yoshiro.

reminds me of Soh/Cursed Soh

(I already had most of these gifs because I'm working on a longer post discussing Soh's identity and the kaleidoscope imagery.)

I mentioned in my post The statue of the Goddess + a Divine Heir that Soh is not descending from heaven. Rather, the Japanese word means to come down from a higher place. The way it was used in the English translation makes it seem like she came from another world. In a way, she did.

I've speculated about where she comes from here: Heaven and the Unknown Land.

She's the previous Maiden who was enshrined as a Goddess so she's likely descending from where she was enshrined. 

But the prequel says she comes from another world, crossing the bridge between heaven and earth.(which can be literal or just means another world)

I've been thinking more about Soh's plaque. I currently believe the Yoshiro mentioned is the former Maiden attached to Soh because if it's our Yoshiro...which world did she descend from? The scrolls show her being 'sacrificed' or chosen as the next Maiden. She does not 'descend into the human world'.

Soh's physical body is likely the previous Spirit Stone.
(Yoshiro praying to Soh's Spirit Stone + trying to get a closer look at it.)

(When Soh defeats Cursed Soh and purifies her old body, which is her spirit stone body holding part of the Goddess, the power that was inside her body is absorbed by her spirit. Because Soh merged with the Goddess, like Yoshiro is doing, she held the Goddess inside her as well. Or part of her. The power combined with the mask gave her enough power to heal Yoshiro and end the cycle.)

There's a Mazo Talisman called Astral Projection which speeds up Soh's ability to recover from Spirit State.

Can we assume Soh is astral projecting from the spirit stone?

When the game begins, I believe Yoshiro has become Soh's new Spirit Stone, because Soh, the Goddess and Yoshiro are all 'one' in the sense of merging or having merged already.
If Soh was still attached to her Spirit Stone, Nanamagari stealing it would have affected her.
(Yoshiro is Soh's new Spirit Stone)

Although Soh can astral project, it is Yoshiro who is able to give her a proper physical form. 

When a Maiden surrenders her body to become a Spirit Stone and lets her spirit wear the mask of the Goddess to allow her to act as messenger for the Goddess(the Goddess acts and speaks through her so she becomes the Goddess but is also the messenger bringing the Goddess)
I wonder if her physical form is the form of the Goddess? Is it the face of the Goddess we look upon at the end?

BUT!

Let's look at the Japanese term used for this mazo talisman!

魂魄

Important links: Link 1, Link 2

This term is apparently not common and specifically has a religious connotation to it.

Here it is called the 'soul of a deceased person'.

I've said before that Kunitsu-Gami has created its own lore and religion inspired by many others. This seems to take inspiration from Taoism?

Read this.

Looking up the 1992 version of the 新华字典 published by the 商务印书馆, on page 195 and page 367 we find respectively:

魂 hún ㄏㄨㄣˊ 旧日迷信的说法，指能离开肉体而存在的精神（(连) ~魄）：~不附体. 灵魂1.人的精神、思想方面活动的总称.2.事物的最精粹最主要的部分。

魄 (一) pò ㄆㄛˋ ❶ 迷信指依附形体而存在的精神（(连) 魂~）：丢魂落~. [...]

Therefore, 魂 refers to the 精神 that can exist without a living body, while 魄 refers to the 精神 whose existence depends on a living body. Because they are two different kinds of 精神, they are sometimes used together, as in 魂魄 to mean all sorts of 精神.

.

魂 is more related to the 陽 Yang side (the male, the bright, the sun side) of the spirit or soul.

魄 is more related to the 陰 Yin side (the female, the dark, the moon side) of the spirit or soul. (X)

.

Hun and po are types of souls in Chinese philosophy and traditional religion. Within this ancient soul dualism tradition, every living human has both a hun spiritual, ethereal, yang soul which leaves the body after death, and also a po corporeal, substantive, yin soul which remains with the corpse of the deceased. Hun and Po

Lunar associations of po are evident in the Classical Chinese terms chanpo 蟾魄 "the moon" (with "toad; toad in the moon; moon") and haopo 皓魄 "moon; moonlight" (with "white; bright; luminous").

Since pò is the 'bright' soul, hún is the 'dark' soul and therefore cognate to yún 雲 'cloud', perhaps in the sense of 'shadowy' because some believe that the hún soul will live after death in a world of shadows.

I've pointed out Soh is associated with the moon.

Soh under the moonlight. Taion's Lightning with a red moon and a poem about a moon on its back. Prayer on a moonlit night. Soh's card having a moon. Soh and the moon are really intertwined.#Kunitsu_Gami#祇 #くにつがみ pic.twitter.com/0ZogYmchVN

— Amaria💮 (@eternalnascency) July 21, 2025

credit

Her spirit state uses the kanji 魂. So 魄 is the body that lays unconscious?

Her physical form, mask and all, is called '実体' here. True form. It's what she loses when Yoshiro is unwell.

While googling, I discovered that '魂魄解放(Soul Release)' is the term used when you regain your power from Batsu. It's what's happening as Soh further joins with the mask. Musabi is used to weave things together. It means Soh is further becoming one with the mask? And through it, the full power of 魂魄 is freed.

Onto speculation...

Perhaps there's a subtle implication here that Cursed Soh is the spirit(魄) of Soh? What remained in her body, the spirit stone? Or...Cursed Soh is 'hun', the ethereal part of Soh as Cursed Soh is said to rule from the heavens. 

Soh is the moon, so Cursed Soh must be the sun? Or could it be the other way around...?

At first I thought: this information could be confirming that I'm right and that Soh's spirit state is a former Yoshiro merged with the Goddess.

But it looks more like it's saying that Soh is a deceased person whose spirit and soul remain. She needs both in order to have a form that is usable. The spirit defines her the physical form and the soul is her mind/consciousness.

So her body is her spirit and her 'spirit state' is her soul.

Brashier cited several Han sources (grave deeds, Book of the Later Han, and Jiaoshi Yilin) attesting beliefs that "the hun remains in the grave instead of flying up to heaven", and suggested it "was sealed into the grave to prevent its escape."Another Han text, the Fengsu Tongyi says, "The vital energy of the hun of a dead person floats away; therefore a mask is made in order to retain it."

One of my earliest observations is Soh and Yoshiro being Yin and Yang.

Cursed Soh is described as '幽明'. Darkness and light. And she's the Goddess having merged with Maidens.

Is it Soh who is associated with the moon or is it Soh and Yoshiro? As they are seen together in 'Soh under the Moonlight' and 'Prayer on a moonlit night'.

It could be that the Maiden is the Moon and the Goddess is the Sun.

Maybe I'm right and Soh's spirit form is in fact, the former Maiden with the descended Goddess? And the Po is the Maiden and the hun is the Goddess? The earthly spirit and the heavenly soul?

Isn't Kunitsukami a kami of the earth?

This caught my eye too:

According to ancient customs, after a person dies, the clothes they were wearing are placed on the corpse. Because the soul is not in the body, the clothes are used to summon the soul. If the soul recognizes its own clothes, it will find the clothes and return to the body.

???

No idea if this is relevant.

I'll have to look more into '魂魄'. But maybe it's not that deep?

The fanart with Yoshiro wanting to eat with Soh got me thinking about why I think Soh has no physical body.

But is it really that simple?

Her being able to have a body is directly related to Yoshiro, but Soh's body remains if Yoshiro is defiled. It doesn't disappear.

Cinematic

If this is just a gameplay issue overlooked, what else are just overlooked things?

Because so much of the game is told visually and through game-play, everything needs to be correct. 

So I will assume it is. After all, Yoshiro doesn't die but becomes defiled.

When you consider Cursed Soh's appearance resembling the merging of Soh and Yoshiro, her body is definitely linked to Yoshiro's body.

In the true ending, her body shatters once more and she ascends.

...

Who is this woman??