More on the Persona (Elements, Folklore, and Transformation) - Konohana Sakura the Priestess

PERSONAS: The Dungeon

In Yukiko's Castle, the higher up the Protagonist and others go, slowly gets more and more dark, covered more in red fog over the white fog that covered the lower four floors. From floor 5 up, the shade is a dark red, and Yukiko's inner thoughts play more and more when you reach each floor, as does some of what she says when greeting people who come to the Inn. The voice soon turns into her real thoughts, yelling at the reporter and demanding he leave her alone. The monsters here are stronger, often mixing with the theme of castles (Knights and Kings are included). Floor 5 turns into a maze of sorts - while it's circular, getting close to a door will mean being sent to another part of the floor, and having to figure out how to get to where you need to go before you face the Avenging Knight.

Yukiko's Castle - Floor 8

Reaching the top, we find a large open area leading to a throne, behind which is a red flag with two wings that spread out behind the Shadow, making it look like a bird ready to take off or in flight. Much of the idea of escaping, of 'getting away' from the 'cage', is played on at this level, as is her need for a Prince to protect her. The Charming Prince, who is summoned to aid Shadow Yukiko, is a bit of a pain to fight against, and will heal Shadow Yukiko as much as he attacks or incapacitates the group.
It's here that Yukiko's Shadow announces that the group are her 'princes', including Chie in the statement and when she begins to complain about her own inability to leave, as well as the fact that she's trapped at the Inn and no one has been able to help her. Like the other Shadows, her dialogue shows not only her darker feelings, but also shows Yukiko's shyness to be partly due to her own self-doubt and fears, as well as her dislike of the Inn and the time it takes up in her life, not to mention the idea of having her 'destiny' planned for her.

The Priestess: Konohana Sakura

The third massive Shadow you face, this is the first one to have 'underlings' or to summon other Shadows to attack you before or during the main attack. The Shadow itself is a large, red bird that often spreads it's larger-than-the-cage wings out while casting spells or summoning her Prince. The continued motif of a caged bird, who has outgrown her cage and needs to escape, is still played here, as is the fear of leaving the cage as well - for all that Shadow Yukiko does her best to escape the cage, she never fully leaves it. If anything, she simply uses it as part of her attack and reason to continually fight, never leaving despite the fact that the door is open and she has the means to escape. The Prince, summoned often after a bit, will do his best to attack the three there to save Yukiko, but once he is defeated, he cannot be summoned back. If anything, he only serves to show the possible toxic thinking that added to Yukiko's suppressed self. The Prince comes when she summons, and does help, but he is not eternal and will not remain by Yukiko's side when 'defeated'.

After Yukiko accepts her dark self and what she felt about her family's Inn, as well as her own position, the Shadow transforms into Konohana Sakura. One of the few Personas who's called by her full name, Konohana Sakura is based on a Japanese Goddess, the wife of the god Ninigi and a symbol of delicate earthly life, especially that of the cherry blossom. After her marriage, when she became pregnant, the god believed she'd been unfaithful. Angry, Konohana entered a door-less hut and set it on fire, declaring any child that survived to be the son of her husband. Considering her triplets survived, the god was showed to be the father.

While Shadow Yukiko is all red, with only her head showing any human part to herself, keeping the black hair and features of Yukiko despite being red and almost unrecognizable. It also lives in a golden cage, one atop a chandelier. All of these things show that the prestige and privilege of living in a 'historic inn' has only served to trap Yukiko, and her red color, the heart-shape on the breast of both Shadow Yukiko and Konohana Sakura also adding to her search for love of some sort, or someone to help her as well. I believe as Konohana, though, this represents various types of love, such as friendly or even familial love, instead of just the idealized love of a 'prince'. 

Once transformed to a Persona, Konohana looks more like a female hero than Chie's own Persona - with flowers and the pink and white color that often are connected to sakura blossoms or with feminine things. Konohana Sakura, unlike Chie's ability to cause massive damage, also ends up with powerful healing and offensive powers. As with the Protagonist and Yosuke, Chie and Yukiko end up with powers that can defeat the others - Chie's Ice against Yukiko's Fire.

The Priestess Card is one of hidden knowledge, of intuition and mystical, hidden knowledge. The ability to heal (as in REALLY heal) has always been put to mystical knowledge. Fire itself could also be part of a mystical or important journey into hidden knowledge - in the Western World, the Virgins of Hestia were said to keep a sacred flame alive for centuries, protecting Rome. Though not the strongest physically, Yukiko and Konohana Sakura are a great one who protects and heals the group, as well as showing her ability to also defend or help in a fight with a great deal of power.

ELEMENT

Element: Agi (Fire)

             Weakness: Bufu (Ice)

Fire is an element that has had a huge impact on humanity and on what humans can do or where humans can survive. It's associated in the classical Greek and Roman traditions with passion and energy. One philosopher, Heraclitius, believed Fire gave rise to all other elements, Fire is often split into various types - Hindu belief splits Fire into that of actual fire, lightning, and the sun. {source: Wikipedia}

In many cases, fire is also considered both a creative and destructive force - like water, it can take any form, but unlike water or many other elements, it's not one that exists on it's own. Fire can only come about if it's created and given something to transform.{Source: The White Goddess}

Yukiko, for her work and being able to deal with school and helping out at the Inn, shows a great deal of energy and ability to work anywhere. Her facing her self results in her beginning her transformation and change, and her work at a hot springs and Inn also ties her to the element of Fire, more in the Hearth sense. The fires that associated with family and home seem to be what helps out Yukiko the most, and what she associates with the most, though her anger and how she channels it to fighting or standing up for herself as she goes from shy to bolder also begins to show. She is passionate about what she wants to do, and after the events in the castle, she begins to show that even more. The association with hot springs, another thing that connects to fire, also adds to her control over fire as her element.

Though Yukiko's element is not as strong against water, there is still that chance of coming into a harmony - once again, hot springs - and as she grows closer to the Protagonist, she begins to show more of her passion and determination, as well as her transformation from someone who is too timid to speak for what she wants to someone who is ready to learn more about herself and to use her intuition to push for what she really wants and what she believes she needs in her life. Though she is still feminine and appears delicate, she is also ready to ignite a firestorm as needed.

One more story to mention...well, also a link.

At one point on Mythbusters, they created a Sawdust Cannon, in order to see about proving something in a viral video. A family member, who worked in a sawmill once during his life, mentioned that it would work, before it did. The reason being that while sawdust and wood chips are small and, compared to bigger pieces, fragile, they have the scary ability of catching fire and spreading among all of them, really quickly. As such, when there was a fire near the sawmill, the fire department was on-call to that area nearly every day for months afterwards, because a small spark had the chance to set fire to more of the sawdust that the mill produced. With Yukiko's focus on fire and cherry blossoms, I believe you have the same idea - the small things that can, with the right spark, turn very dangerous.

Next: Social Links In Inaba (April-May)