A Floral Finisher is a special attack used immediately after killing a demon, when its body turns grey and falls through the air as time warps and slows. If a specific Celestial Brush technique is used as a finishing attack on the demon in mid-air, it drops Demon Fangs or other remnants before the body disintegrates into a large patch of flowers on the ground.
Overview
Applying the right Finisher to each enemy is an excellent way to farm, and the first method available before Amaterasu acquires a secondary weapon (allowing her to use the Sub-Reflector Counterattack) or the Golden Fury/Brown Rage Dōjō techniques.
Floral Finishers do not work if Amaterasu has already struck the enemy with something else during its dying state (a different brushstroke, a Divine Instrument, or the Thief's Glove), or if she has just killed the enemy in certain ways. Cherry Bomb disintegrates the enemy's body upon death, eliminating the chance to use Floral Finisher. If an enemy's Floral Finisher is normally Power Slash, actually killing it with Power Slash will prevent the finisher from working properly-instead, deliver the final blow with a different attack and slash the body in mid-air afterward.
Most bosses and sub bosses do not have Floral Finishers, except for the individual Tube Foxes (Power Slash)
Finishers
Ōkamiden
The Floral Finisher concept reappears in Ōkamiden, although modified. Instead of dropping Demon Fangs which can be directly used to buy items, the correct finishing technique now drops different demon remnants such as bones or skin. The right combinations of remnants can be taken to a blacksmith to produce or enhance items.
Trivia
According to some demon's lore, their attributed weaknesses and most effective methods of exorcism help imply that Floral Finishers are the result of the penultimate method of ensuring their purification and annihilation.
- Amanojaku within Japanese lore are said to be akin to that of the "evil side" of the consciousness as well as a sort of demon. Within Shinto and Buddhist thought, one such way to deny such dark impulses is to consciously halt and envision their destruction before ignoring them, allowing them no way to tempt or corrupt their listener.
- The living corrupted statues that make up the Headless group ultimately represent something akin to a wraith or a ghoul, but of a spiritual kind with longing and physical attachment to the living world. Within Shinto thought, one matter of importance is of how all souls and that which they inhabit have an ultimate resting place and need for closure, and within Buddhist thought, one such base creed is of how the physical world is always changing, with nothing lasting forever; the use of bombs to rid of their physical form may highlight this.
- Namahage come to provide a contrast to their real world benevolent counterparts, being the embodiment of loneliness turned into madness within the harsh environment of Kamui, and possibly representing the examples of those who give into despair, turn to perverse practices and crime, or are exiled and banished due to being bad individuals. In an interesting twist, so does defeating these demons and sending their way on the wind come in line with the real life practices of the Namahage New Years tradition in heralding change and disciplining the wicked in the face of a new beginning.
- The Clay Army represents the restless dead and of those of warriors whose conquests were cut short upon their gruesome defeat. Driven to obsession, and living in times before the coming of introspective religions such as Buddhism, such state of theirs allows for greater evil like Orochi to possess them into their ranks. The use of the Veil of Mist to give them reflection and penance helps them break free from this curse and allows them eternal rest with closure.
- Blue Cyclops and Great Tengu are hinted to be the souls of spiritually powerful and dedicated humans that have been lead astray wayward and now are reincarnated into forms to reflect their wrongful attainment of power for selfish purposes. As such beings were monks and ascetics that sought the ways of enlightenment, the use of water and the cold helps to quench their fiery zealousness that has set themselves ablaze into abandon; it should be further noted that rituals and practices such as misogi and intense training during the late winter are practiced in real life Japan for those who truly seek the full rite of understanding greater spiritual depth, as need for cleansing one's spirit, as well as facing adversity and experiencing suffering, is integral to understanding life and its many paths.
- The Ogre Trio are said to be the wardens of hell, and within real life legend, are said to also be related with powerful natural forces and disasters, but so are there oni who are not all that benevolent within the world, and wreck havoc where they go. As such, these more evil oni who terrorize the living and unleash hell upon the world are often known in tales to be warded off with heavenly aid, where divine retribution, be it sacred lightning that comes from the gods of thunder themselves or the purging flames of hell by their own karma turned back onto them, is used to smite their kind and halt their wrath.