Any Sakuya Izayoi thoughts, theories, etc.?

[erired1110]

Greetings, I thought it would be interesting if I made a thread concerning the details about Remilia's maid, Sakuya Izayoi.
I mean, there is so much mystery surrounding her character and I am surprised that only a few people have shared their
thoughts and opinions surrounding her status, development, and placement of a character.

For example, have you ever wondered why Sakuya Izayoi only seems to be concerned about her mistress and her welfare at the mansion and nothing else, even though she is just a sole human?

Of course, the most popular theory is the vampire hunter theory, where Sakuya wanted to hunt down Remilia for the sake of her own species' survival but ends up getting defeated by her. (with Remilia changing her fate and name, of course)

But, what clues are there to make this theory closer into fact? The only 3 pieces of evidence are that:
1. She is the only human in the mansion.
2. She carries silver knives, which are a vampires' weakness
and 3. Her real name isn't "Sakuya Izayoi" but a different name that we don't know of yet. Remilia gave her that name for unknown reasons.

Of course, there are many more mysteries of Sakuya that have yet to be solved. That's why I made this thread, so that people can post interesting facts, links,
clues, etc. that may or may not reveal who Sakuya Izayoi really is, and why she decided to work for Remilia.

I'd like to hear your thoughts! 

[RoamerB]

One thing I'm convinced about Sakuya is that she has no memories of her life before becoming Remilia's maid. If you were working in the mansion before she arrived and tried to ask her what she was before coming there, she'd tell you she doesn't know. Because of her amnesia, she doesn't know what she was called before she started serving her.

[erired1110]

Yeah, amnesia could be possible. I mean, why else would she just have her life being devoted to somebody not of her species?  :V

...But what if she could be a spy of some sort or a long-time temporary servant of Remilia? ((I have a theory that is based off of speculation of this))

[Hello Purvis]

Sakuya is actually Meiling.

Think about it.

[MANoBadAssGar Jr.]

What about, Sakuya is

Spoiler:

Eirin

child?
and doesn't inherit the

Spoiler:

immortality

, but gain the mutated power......time stop.......
and the red eyes,

Spoiler:

Eirin partner might be moon rabbit

[/s]

sorry if that story had been told, i'm still a rather new kids around here

[Sophilia]

I honestly don't know what is up with her.  I've seen lots of theories of her origin, but none of them really strike me as adding up to the Sakuya we know.  There's just some things where you have to throw up your hands and say, "Insufficient data."

The one's I've seen around:

1) Akyuu's theory of a vampire hunter
2) Abandoned little girl with eerie powers, taken in by SDM and raised as a maid
3) Super Secret Lunarian Super Spy
4) Renko, whose power evolved like Mary's did
5) Yet another Diospawn
6) Just a normal maid that got hired at this really weird place, and then magic shenanigans ensued

Of course, in the finest tradition, the right answer is probably "7) Something even ZUN hasn't thought up yet."

[erired1110]

Alright, here are some strange things that I've noticed about Sakuya ((feel free to add to this list)):

-Her ability is just unique to her, so far
-Her eyes change color from blue to red when she is angry.
-She has a 'rude' sense of humor around other characters sometimes, despite being a human maid.
-She partakes in Impossible Spell Card even though she is rich and doesn't need money to live.
-She shoots magic bullets and fireballs other than knives sometimes (we still don't know how she learnt them in the first place for being primary a melee user)
and last but not least:
-Her real name isn't Sakuya.

[Drake]

I am surprised that only a few people have shared their
thoughts and opinions surrounding her status, development, and placement of a character.

Sakuya was probably the most discussed character for the first like four years of the Windows era, and even afterwards. People don't talk about her much now because literally every idea that's ever been possible to talk about has likely already been talked about at some point lol. In fact, I would bet that ZUN writing in Akyuu's commentary on the mysteries surrounding Sakuya in her PMiSS article are exactly for the purpose of saying "these explanations are all just theories", especially since they all seem to refer to theories that already existed before PMiSS.

Remilia gave her that name for unknown reasons.

She wanted to give her a new name and it sounded cool, would be my guess, given Remilia.

-Her ability is just unique to her, so far
-Her eyes change color from blue to red when she is angry.
-She has a 'rude' sense of humor around other characters sometimes, despite being a human maid.
-She partakes in Impossible Spell Card even though she is rich and doesn't need money to live.
-She shoots magic bullets and fireballs other than knives sometimes (we still don't know how she learnt them in the first place for being primary a melee user)

- Most characters have completely unique abilities.
- This was in the fighting games when she used some Spell Cards but otherwise this isn't seen anymore. In EoSD her eyes were red in-game and blue in the endings, and it's likely ZUN just revised her eye color and gave a reasonable-sounding explanation for her eyes during EoSD.
- So does everyone lol
- So does Remilia...
- So do other humans.

[andykhang]

Add from the point above:

-And she isn't the only one who have timey-whimey power. Kaguya have that too.
-Above, and I got a mini-theory for why that happen is because of the Doppler effect when she's streching space by widening time.
-Above
-I don't think a maid's salary would be much anyway, and is she even needing money for herself, aside from neccesity?
-Above, and she could does that? In what spell card?

[erired1110]

Add from the point above:

-And she isn't the only one who have timey-whimey power. Kaguya have that too.
-Above, and I got a mini-theory for why that happen is because of the Doppler effect when she's streching space by widening time.
-Above
-I don't think a maid's salary would be much anyway, and is she even needing money for herself, aside from neccesity?
-Above, and she could does that? In what spell card?

-I meant her abillity to stop time and control space. Not eternity, which is just slowing down time.
-She doesn't accept a salary. According to canon, she isn't being paid to work.
-In EoSD, there are a few spell cards and nonspells in which she doesn't only use knives. For example, Illusion World~ The World has fireballs and knives.

[MANoBadAssGar Jr.]

-And she isn't the only one who have timey-whimey power. Kaguya have that too.

-I don't think a maid's salary would be much anyway, and is she even needing money for herself, aside from neccesity?

-wind priest, You're such a dissapointmet to Diospawn...........

-neccesity for her mistress whim you mean?

[erired1110]

I have a theory relating to Sakuya possibly being in the next Touhou game (Touhou 15.5) it may be a bit too big of a stretch though... (this theory is also very long to explain so I'll summarize it for now, unless if you guys want a full explanation)

Basically, Sakuya may be an old servant of Sumireko or another person from the outside world. She may be two bodies, one girl (similar to Ran) and she may be a target of whoever is causing the incident to happen because of her unique powers or something.

[Hello Purvis]

She may be two bodies, one girl (similar to Ran)

Lo que tu hablas, Wilis?

[the old guy]

one girl

Can you please not call fully grown women "girls"?

[andykhang]

-I meant her abillity to stop time and control space. Not eternity, which is just slowing down time.

Kaguya could control space too, remember the infinite corridor of her, or how she make the entire area around her house unchanged by history?

[erired1110]

Can you please not call fully grown women "girls"?

I apologize, from now I'll call her a lady.

Anyway, the theory has to do with Reimu being the first one to question Sakuya's humanity. You know how Reimu/Miko can hear/detect divine spirits, right? Well, I think that Sakuya is actually a spirit possessing a human, similar to Ran. Note that "Sakuya" isn't Sakuya's real name, and AoCF is all about possesion and "humaning away". My theory is a bit of a stretch, but it's just speculation.

[erired1110]

Kaguya could control space too, remember the infinite corridor of her, or how she make the entire area around her house unchanged by history?

Oh right, I forgot. Maybe Sakuya got her powers from Kaguya or one of the Lunarians, after all. It's a possibility.

[PK]

Well there's the fact that Eirin was surprised to see Sakuya, although the reason is specifically unknown.

[Drake]

Except it's known now that it's because Eirin would have recognized the name Sakuya from Konohana-Sakuyahime. It's just more connection to Eirin's identity as Omoikane.

[Lt Colonel Summers]

Except it's known now that it's because Eirin would have recognized the name Sakuya from Konohana-Sakuyahime. It's just more connection to Eirin's identity as Omoikane.

Wow, nice point there you just said...
Nobody ever thought about making the connection between Sakuya and Konohana-Sakuyahime. Even I didn't until I saw your post...

Though my headcanon has been that Sakuya is a former member of the Kempeitai - Imperial Japan's equivalent of the Gestapo - which has been long investigating and trying to acquire the powers of Gensokyo for Hideki Tojo, similar to the Nazis wanting to acquire supernatural powers for Hitler.

[andykhang]

Not really...I kinda know that already. I think this fact is just obscure that many people who know Touhou, but doesn't dive deep into it know.

[Drake]

Not really...I kinda know that already. I think this fact is just obscure that many people who know Touhou, but doesn't dive deep into it know.

I meant "it is known" in a broad sense that it's the consensus with the fandom that understands the connection, not that it's common knowledge at all.

EDIT: Wait I think you were responding to Summers, not me. Never mind this then.

[Spacechurro]

This may seem kind of random, but Sakuya could have been outright created by Remilia (Or Remi told Patchy to do it)
-No identity beyond the scarlet mansion
-No name before Remilia
-Young forever
-Time controlling powers()

But one problem is why?

There's also this weird theory that has no evidence, but I think is cool, that one that Sakuya is Marisa.

[the old guy]

I believe in the Lunarian Sakuya theory. I feel that there's plenty of evidence for it in Canon.

Eirin recognizing her in IN, her theme being called "Lunar Dial". I also remember Reimu saying something about her not feeling human, but I don't remember where she said that, It would also explain her coldness towards humans.

Personally I think that she was exiled from the moon at a young age, hence why she doesn't remember her past.

[MANoBadAssGar Jr.]

There's also this weird theory that has no evidence, but I think is cool, that one that Sakuya is Marisa.

That person not allright. more so than me

[erired1110]

There's also this weird theory that has no evidence, but I think is cool, that one that Sakuya is Marisa.

Interesting. That's another one that could be possible, given that Sakuya and Marisa look similar and are based off of Dio Brando and Johnathan Joestar respectively. (from JJBA)

[Sophilia]

When it comes to Jojo and Touhou, I can only think that it's Remilia that actually embodies Dio, since she gets all the Dio lines, the "charisma" and its "break", and of course being a Vampire.  The only Dioness that Sakuya has is in her time ability, so if we're going there, Sakuya's just Remi's Stand.

Also Marisa seems a lot more like Joseph to me to be honest...

[Hello Purvis]

Yuugi's the Joestar, mangs.

[Drake]

This may seem kind of random, but Sakuya could have been outright created by Remilia (Or Remi told Patchy to do it)

To mention, "Sakuya is a homunculus" (i.e. artificial human) is one of the minor theories Akyuu mentions as well. Obviously it's still bologna, but yeah.

I believe in the Lunarian Sakuya theory. I feel that there's plenty of evidence for it in Canon.

>Eirin recognizing her in IN
She didn't recognize her, she was "surprised to see her". I just explained why that passage exists a few posts up. It's poorly worded in the profile (should've probably been 咲夜の名前を聞いて大変驚く/"surprised to hear Sakuya's name"), but ZUN has posted before that Bougetsushou holds a hint for this, which is of course where we hear about Konohana-Sakuyahime specifically.

>her theme being called "Lunar Dial"
Luna Dial/月時計 is a reference to a watch that comes from a book by mystery novelist Fujiki Rin. I don't know the specific details but ZUN wrote as such in the omake music comments. Note that basically nothing about her besides this has moon imagery and despite being a big role in Bougetsushou there's nothing that would suggest a connection to her at all.

>I also remember Reimu saying something about her not feeling human
In EoSD Stage 6 she says "So that maid there was really human?" which is a pretty expected response given she could y'know stop time and stuff. In general Sakuya's disposition is not very human-seeming at times because she can act quite cold and callously and makes dark jokes.

[Spacechurro]

To mention, "Sakuya is a homunculus" (i.e. artificial human) is one of the minor theories Akyuu mentions as well. Obviously it's still bologna, but yeah.

Oh my god...........

Sakuya is Jesus!