Lady Butterfly

Where is this boss located?

This is considered the main boss of Hirata Estate, accessible only behind the secret temple door at the end of Hirata Audience Chamber. This area can only be unlocked by defeating Jozou the Drunkard. The Hidden Temple’s doors can only be opened by having the Hidden Temple Key.

How to defeat this boss?

Before facing this boss, you should have at least upgraded your vitality gauge once, and at least obtained the first battle memory (+attack power) from Gyoubu Oniwa. Also, having access to the Nightjar Slash combat art will make this battle a bit easier.

Lady Butterfly has only one health bar but the fight against her has two phases. For the first phase, you’ll be dealing with her agile attacks, including two unblockable moves that can deal a lot of damage. You have to do your best to preserve as much vitality and healing items as possible since the second phase of the battle against her can be very punishing against players who make frequent mistakes.

To know how to deal with her, you have to know her different attacks and how to deal with them. First, her unblockable sweep attack. This deals a lot of damage and can catch you off guard since she’ll be very erratic and unpredictable. The only way to avoid it is by jumping in front of her or vaulting over her as shown below.

Her other unblockable attack is the overhead leg drop. This also deals massive damage so if you see her walking on her string or jumping overhead, do your best in getting out of the way before her attack connects. A well-timed shuriken attack can also interrupt her action (and her other similar “high-ground” attacks), stunning her for a couple of seconds as well.

Aside from melee attacks, she’ll be actively shooting you with projectiles that you can block. Her basic melee combos can be blocked but her final heel drop can cause a lot of posture damage. The only way to successfully protect yourself against this is by a well-timed parry.

For the first phase, you can exploit her slow recovery animation with consecutive Nightjar Slashes. If you manage to land one slash, continue holding L1 and spamming R1 to ensure that Sekiro will continue using this combat art. This will cause her to get locked down in a Nightjar Slash loop, allowing you to end the first phase of the battle with relative ease. Even if Lady Butterfly manages to block some of your attacks, her posture gauge will continuously build until you break it and land a deathblow on her.

For the second phase, she’ll still perform the same attacks she has during the previous phase, and will have more attacks at her disposal. you’ll need to know how to react to them. Her projectiles will now include homing butterfly-like projectiles that will still deal damage even if you block them. Your only way of avoiding damage from these projectiles is by evading them completely or standing behind a wooden pillar.

She will also summon several apparitions. You can’t damage them but they can inflict unblockable damage to you. Don’t bother wasting your limited supply of snap seeds; it can only dispel the nearest apparitions, which Lady Butterfly can re-summon as many times as she needed for the entirety of the battle. The most reliable way to deal with them is by luring them in one corner of the battlefield (while keeping an eye at Lady Butterfly) and running away from them. They’re not that fast so flanking them should be no problem.

The apparitions will fade away after a few seconds but don’t let your guard down. They’ll turn into bright butterflies and hover in the air for a bit before suddenly homing towards you. Their massive numbers can easily deplete your vitality gauge if you didn’t anticipate this. You can evade this barrage by running to one side. These projectiles can also be blocked by the pillars.

Unlike the first phase where you can use cheap tricks on her, this phase will entirely depend on anticipating her attacks and reacting properly. The best times to attack her is after evading her unblockable attacks, parry her heel drop (at the end of her normal combo) or if you manage to shoot her down with a shuriken when she’s trying to jump. Don’t be too aggressive and fight defensively, while waiting patiently for the safe opportunities to counterattack.

Take note that after landing the deathblow in the second phase, don’t let go of your controller to celebrate your victory yet! You still have to perform a shinobi assassination quickly after that. If you fail to trigger this finishing move, Lady Butterfly will recover and continue the battle until you land a hit on her and break her posture.

Boss Drops

* Battle Memory (increases attack power permanently)

* Sakura Droplet (give to Kuro in Ashina Castle or Divine Child of Rejuvenation at Inner Sanctum - Senpou Temple to permanently get one resurrection charge)

Video Walkthrough

How to defeat Lady Butterfly