Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice boss fights are by no means easy, and Lady Butterfly is among the tougher fights. Here are the cinematics for her difficult boss fight as well as a gameplay walkthrough. Captured on PC. The battle with Lady Butterfly is one of the earlier boss fights in Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, but that doesn't mean this boss is a pushover. Lady Butterfly is probably the fastest enemy players will have faced by this point in the game, and she requires you to learn a lot about deflecting enemy attacks, anticipating multiple threats, and using all the tools at your disposal to strike at the boss and do damage in order to eventually take her down. You'll find Lady Butterfly at the end of the Hirata Estate level, which you can access once you locate a particular old woman in the Ashina Outskirts area. Talk to her and she'll give you an offering bell you can take back to the Dilapidated Temple; give it to the Buddha Statue near the Sculptor, and you'll be transported to Hirata Estate, and three years into the past, to see the events that unfolded there. Getting to Lady Butterfly is a long, tough fight, but quick reflexes and the right Shinobi Prosthetic tools can help make quick work of her. Lady Butterfly employs apparitions in her fight, which is why Snapseeds are extremely useful to bring with you. You'll get one of these consumables from a wounded samurai just outside Lady Butterfly's boss room, and we've got a handy guide that will help you find more, as well. When Lady Butterfly summons her ghostly apparitions, use the Snapseeds to dispel them--just make sure you're close to the ghosts, since Snapseeds are only effective in a radius around your body, and they won't work if you're too far away. Check out the rest of our Sekiro guides for help finding all the game's prosthetics, including some key early-game ones, and beating bosses including the Chained Ogre and the Blazing Bull.<doc-sep>Sekiro’s Lady Butterfly boss fight will test your patience. You’ll need to to learn her moves and react accordingly. In this guide, we’ll show you how to defeat Lady Butterfly with the most effective Shinobi Prosthetic, our favorite Combat Art, and a handful of strategies to disrupt her relentless attacks. Lady Butterfly Phase 1: Floating attacks, shurikens, and attacking defensively When you run into the arena, block. Lady Butterfly will always run to you and throw her projectiles. Block them. Knock Lady Butterfly down with the Loaded Shuriken Your Loaded Shuriken is the best Prosthetic Tool for this fight. Using it at the right moment disrupts Lady Butterfly’s attacks and opens her up for damage. Whenever Lady Butterfly jumps and stays in the air, it’s time to throw a shuriken — but only when she’s moving. You’ll have to wait a second or two before she does that. If a shuriken lands when she’s hovering, she’ll block it. If a shuriken lands while she’s moving, she’ll fall to the ground. Close the gap between you, and attack. You can even disrupt her unblockable Perilous Attack with this technique. You can see an example of this above. Here’s how it plays out: Lady Butterfly jumps into the air. We get jumpy and throw a shuriken. She blocks it. She starts to move, and we throw another shuriken. The shuriken knocks her to the ground, and we attack. This is a reliable way to prevent her from causing damage and open her up to taking damage. You’ll have tons of opportunities to use it. Just be patient. It’s supremely useful in both phases of this fight. Don’t be jumpy. Don’t waste many Spirit Emblems on shurikens that she’ll block. Attack after she attacks The worst mistake you can make in pretty much every boss fight is attacking without a plan. Pretty much every enemy (and particularly bosses) are happy to disrupt your attacks and cause major damage. So our advice for Lady Butterfly is about attacking only after she attacks. It’s defense followed by offense. Attack Lady Butterfly after she finishes a flurry on the ground. Block her attacks, maybe Deflect if you’re feeling confident, and when she’s done, attack her back. Your first hit is likely to land, dealing Vitality (health) damage. She’ll block for a while afterward, but that’s fine. You’ll still deal Posture damage. Above, she follows our flurry with her ground-based Perilous Attack. As soon as you see the red kanji appear over Wolf’s head, Step Dodge away. Every Perilous Attack in the game is designed to obliterate your health, and this is no exception. The best Combat Art for Lady Butterfly We love the Nightjar Slash Combat Art for disrupting her attacks and closing the distance between you and Lady Butterfly. Don't worry so much about causing big Vitality (health) damage. Just chip away. And every time she blocks, she loses a little more Posture. (Just to make it super clear, you’ll see this same advice in the next section.) Lady Butterfly’s attacks to watch for Your fight with Lady Butterfly is about slowly chipping away at her Vitality until you can do some meaningful Posture Damage. That means using every chance you have to deal damage — even if it’s only a little bit at a time. Lady Butterfly’s most basic attack is a swipe with each hand, followed by a downward kick. She’ll use it a lot. Whenever you see her wind up the kick with her foot in the air, Step Dodge and immediately hit the attack button to Dodge Counterattack. She also has a sweeping Perilous Attack. If you’re lucky, she’ll do it as a standalone move. More often, though, she’ll do it at the end of a long string of attacks. If she’s on the ground and the red kanji appears, she’s going to sweep. Jump and press jump again to Jump Kick her and deal some extra Posture Damage. (You can see above that we panic-dodged first, then hopped back in for the Jump Kick, so you’ve got a little wiggle room here.) Next, watch for her to do a darting, three jump hover accompanied by a yell. She’s trying to jump on your head here. When she’s right above you, she’ll pause for a moment. Step Dodge out of the way, and Counterattack as soon as she lands. Finally, she’ll follow an attack by jumping back and floating. While she’s hovering, she’ll do an elaborate windup, then dive straight at you. While she’s winding up, Step Dodge to the side. If you’re quick, you can even get in two hits like we did above. Use the wooden posts for protection If you need to heal, run away and hide behind one of the wooden posts. Put it between you and Lady Butterfly, and they’ll block her projectile attacks. You’re safe to pop a Pellet or drink from your Healing Gourd. Lady Butterfly Phase 2: Summons and Snap Seeds The second phase of the Lady Butterfly boss fight adds minions to the battlefield. When they appear, you have a few options: Use a Snap Seed Quick Item to make them all disappear. This is perfectly reasonable, but Snap Seeds are an exceptionally rare item, which makes them precious. Don’t waste them. Run away from Lady Butterfly so that you’re not fighting her and them at the same time. At that point, you can either avoid or kill a few minions. Killing them has the chance of generating Spirit Emblems — keep this in mind if you’re running low. They’ll disappear eventually, and your main goal should be minimizing the damage they could cause. Prevent Lady Butterfly from spawning her minions. You can prevent her from ever spawning her minions with the shuriken tactic we used above. It’s possible, but it’s not easy. As soon as you finish Phase 1, refill your health, and run to the spot where she reappears near the giant statue opposite where you entered. As soon as she lands on the ground, attack. Causing damage is good, but the real focus here is preventing her from summoning her minions. Attack relentlessly to keep disrupting her. Whenever she hovers in the air, use your shurikens to bring her back down to solid ground. Attack relentlessly. As you can see above, we used the Nightjar Slash Combat Art, which is an excellent way to disrupt her attacks and keep her blocking. Every block means a little more Posture damage. It also closes the gap between Wolf and Lady Butterfly, which means you’re effectively guaranteed to connect every time you use it. Lady Butterfly drops, items, and rewards Defeat Lady Butterfly, and you’ll receive the Memory: Lady Butterfly. Use that at a Sculptor’s Idol to level up your attack power. You’ll also receive the Sakura Droplet, which gives you an additional Resurrection opportunity.<doc-sep>
Lady Butterfly is one of the toughest skill check bosses you’ll encounter in Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. It is technically possible to reach her quite early as long as you have the right key items. However, she will easily humble unprepared players with her lightning-fast attacks and unique ninja tricks. In this guide we’ll explain how to prepare for and weather Lady Butterfly’s unrelenting assault. Sekiro: Defeating Lady Butterfly Shortly before the Lady Butterfly fight you’ll meet a wounded samurai who gives you a curious item: Snap Seeds. It’s not immediately apparent how or when you should use the Snap Seeds, but you will need them. In fact, before you challenge Lady Butterfly directly you should first go out and find more Snap Seeds. Finding Snap Seeds Snap Seeds can be found along the same cliffs where you encounter the Great Serpent. If you’ve already survived the Great Serpent encounter, you can return without fear of encountering it a second time. Specifically, a stack of five Snap Seeds lies near the palanquin where you stabbed the Great Serpent’s eye. With the Snap Seeds in hand you can challenge Lady Butterfly. Bolstering your stats as much as you can beforehand isn’t a bad idea either. If you can, try to defeat Gyoubu Oniwa first since doing so boosts your combat potential. Fighting Lady Butterfly The actual Lady Butterfly fight seems intimidating at first, but she’s actually quite manageable once you figure out her routine. Her close-range attacks are quick, but are also surprisingly easy to dodge/deflect. Your first goal is to whittle down her vitality so that her posture doesn’t recover as fast. Whenever she finishes a combo, slip in for a quick counter-hit. Also, when she’s leaping in the air, you can knock her down with the shuriken launcher prosthetic tool. Lady Butterfly also has two “danger” moves you need to watch out for. The first is a lunging sweep which you can avoid by jumping. The second is a high jump which transitions into a heavily damaging throw if it connects. You can avoid the throw by quickly dodging backwards as she comes down. Even though she only has one deathblow counter, Lady Butterfly is actually a two-phase fight. After you fell her once, she’ll reveal her deception and come back for a second go. During the second phase she’ll also summon spirits who will try to attack you with melee swings. After a few moments the spirits will also transform into hard-to-dodge butterfly projectiles. Use the Snap Seeds to quickly banish the spirits and get back to fighting Lady Butterfly. Since the Snap Seeds are limited-use items, you should only use them if you’re confident you can win the battle. Aside from the spirits Lady Butterfly doesn’t have any other new tricks during phase two. Just keep up the pressure to break her posture and the battle will be yours.