Thread:SpiritedDreaming/@comment-29010798-20160712111215/@comment-26397825-20160712113341

They mentioned the list before the Maiden idea was created though.

It seems far more likely to me that the list was originally a list of people who could give Cinder, Emerald and Mercury trouble if they got in their way. Pyrrha had polarity, Mercury has metal legs; if she realised she could give him serious trouble.

So the list was people that they wanted to 'defeat' somehow and get out of the way; such as when they staged the Yang attack on Mercury. She was basically confined to her room afterwards and couldn't interfere with their plans. She's a heavy hitter; even if Cinder and Neo have no problems taking her on, she'd still put up a good fight against Mercury and Emerald, and if she landed a few decent hits on them one of their key players could be knocked out of the fight. So they took her out.

It was just pure serendipity that 'the list' was left vague enough that people automatically assumed that it was foreshadowig possible Maiden candidates.