Sara Butterfly

"Sara Butterfly"

- No, I'm not! I'm a friend! A friendly friend of friendliness! Sara Butterfly is one of Lorecraft Academy's main characters. She is a student at Lorecraft Academy. She is the second youngest of the main characters, behind Natalie. She represented Lorecraft Academy in the Talent Showdown event against Kings and Queens Academy.

Personality
Sara is an energetic girl, very eager to make friends. She values friendship very highly, putting her friends' well-being above her own, sometimes leading to her putting her own safety at risk, simply for the sake of others'. Sara is uncomfortable with negative topics of conversation, usually trying to change the subject or avoid the conversation altogether. She has on occasion doubted herself, but continues to try to do what she thinks is best regardless.

Sara is not always the smartest. She can be very clueless, and sometimes persists on a certain course of action due to how headstrong she can be, even if smarter alternatives present themselves. While Sara has always seen her decisions through to the end, she can realize her faults in hindsight.

She's also very honest and upfront with people, which makes Sara a trustworthy person. While she doesn't always makes the wisest decisions, it is always in good nature, and has stated there's no worse feeling for her than not helping when she could have.

The first day at Lorecraft Academy
Sara arrived at Lorecraft Academy, filled with enthusiasm. She loudly proclaims she's ready to start the year, to Lewis' annoyance. Alongside him, she meets Mizu and Amelia here. Her excitement remains undiminished as she rushes towards the school as soon as the gates open. After listening to a speech given by Darklaw, she rushes inside to find her room, which she eventually does, with help from Amelia. Sara seems upset she and Amelia aren't sharing a room, but Amelia reassures her there will be plenty of future opportunities to spend time together. While she is looking around the room, another girl enters. After introducing herself as Natalie, she discovers the girl is her roommate, which she gets very excited about. She fantasizes about how great the year will be, after which she starts unpacking.

After she and Natalie finish, they decide to have lunch with the others. She is about to leave the room, only to have Carol smack the door in her face. Here she is introduced to both Carol, Zeva and, once they meet up with the boys, Alex. During lunch, a lot of shenanigans happen. Amidst it all, Sara shows off her main element of magic: Fire. When Lewis snarks at her once again, she asks him why he always expects the worst of her. Amelia points out she managed to lose her roommate, which causes Sara to go uncharacteristically quiet, not even reacting much to Amelia pointing towards Natalie, leaving the food court upset instead. When Natalie catches up to Sara in their room, Sara acts distant towards her. She states that she just wanted to be friends, and to not be alone anymore. Natalie begins to lament herself messing up, mentioning her ability. When Sara asks about, Natalie explains that she can hear people's thoughts, but has no control over it, hearing every thought from every person nearby. Realizing Natalie's hardships, Sara goes up to Natalie and tells her they're gonna find a way to control it together. After getting no response from Natalie, she eventually realizes she has passed out. She quickly runs out of the room to go get help.

She quickly rushes to her friends who are still in the food court, asking for their help. Lewis goes to get the school nurse, Amelia accompanies Sara to where Natalie is. Amelia runs her hands over Natalie's body, telling Sara she's fine. Then the nurse arrives, and analyzes Natalie. She summons a stretcher, asking one person to help carry her to the infirmary. Sara is quick to answer, wanting to help Natalie in any way she can. While on their way to the infirmary, Lewis asks Sara what happened. Not wanting to reveal Natalie's secret without her knowing, she tries to lie her way out, which Lewis doesn't fall for. At the infirmary, Sara manages to convince Lewis to leave Natalie alone for now.

Chapters covering these events:
 * "Day One at Lorecraft"
 * "Shaky Beginnings"

Learning a truth about Natalie
When Sara is returning to her room, she runs into Carol. She attempts to greet her, but Carol coldly brushes past her. Amelia then crashes into Sara, sending them rolling down the stairs. Sara asks what's up with Carol, Amelia explains that Zeva left. They both set out to find Carol, Sara taking the 2nd and 3rd floor. She has no luck finding the anger-ridden girl. Sara decides to pay Natalie a visit. The nurse tells her to go to bed, saying a night's rest will do Natalie good. When Sara is about to leave, she and the nurse pick up on Natalie murmuring. When they listen more closely, Natalie seems to behaving a conversation with herself, switching between the voice Sara is familiar with and a more aggressive voice. Sara wonders what is happening. The aggressive voice constantly talks down on Natalie. Sara tries to interject, but the nurse tells her not to interrupt. As this downward trend continues, Sara seems to have had enough and decides to intervene, despite what the nurse said. She is stopped by the aggressive voice changing the topic to her. The voice claims she's as rotten as everyone else Natalie has supposedly met. Sara denies this. The nurse tells Sara Natalie can't hear what she's saying, which doesn't deter her one bit. Sara then gets the idea to switch to thinking, and it works. Sara tries to encourage Natalie, but the other voice continues its down-talking, revealing itself to be a demon, and the one truly in control of Natalie's body. Sara remains persistent, piquing the demon's interest. She leaves afterwards. Sara seems dejected, feeling she couldn't help Natalie. She proceeds to go back to bed to get some sleep, as per the nurse's suggestion.

Chapters covering these events:
 * "Zeva's Departure"
 * "Natalie's Secret"

Meeting Jocelyn
A month after her first day, Sara meets another girl, who moves into their room as a transfer student. In a rather unusual way, the girl introduces herself as Jocelyn. Sara leaves Jocelyn to her own devices and meets up with Carol and Amelia. She suggests to meet up with the boys, which both are fine with. After a while, Sara notices Jocelyn and Natalie are taking quite some time to meet up with her and the others, so she goes to check on them. She finds Jocelyn uncomfortable, and Natalie just unnaturally laughing. When Sara looks at Natalie's face, she realizes the demon voice is back. Sara tells the demon to leave Natalie alone. The demon makes a lot of claims about herself and Natalie. Sara remains determined to get rid of this demon once and for all. The demon leaves for the time being, and Natalie is left unconscious. She tells Jocelyn to put Natalie on her bed and suggests for her to meet the others.

Chapters covering these events:
 * "New and Awkward"

Vs. Lewis
Sara returns to the rest of the group, bringing Jocelyn along. Both Lewis and Amelia introduce themselves to her. After she suffers another jab from Lewis, she excitedly claims their activities, except she's forgotten what she had planned. Lewis adds that they never told them either. Sara claims she was certain she wrote notes for everyone, which she did, but she forget to send, leading to her getting slapped upside the head by Lewis. When the group are thinking what to do, Sara is grabbed by a startled who, who suddenly woke up from Jocelyn poking at her. Carol has an idea that seems of questionable legality, but Lewis is quick to disregard it. When Amelia suggests a stroll around the academy, Sara notes she is more of an action girl, punching and kicking the air to illustrate this. One of the kicks almost hits Lewis, who ducks to dodge this. Sara mumbles just too loud that Lewis was lucky she wasn't trying, which Lewis responds to by saying he could take out Sara in a few minutes. Sara takes this as a challenge, and the two agree to have a duel. Sara says to meet in the school's frontyard in 20 minutes.

Sara is not doing much to prepare, instead she is more interested in what Jocelyn is doing. Jocelyn explains about her harp, which leads Sara to assume Jocelyn to be a great fighter. When Jocelyn questions Sara about not preparing, she says she's got this in the bag, showing off a gymnastics routine. Sara and Lewis meet in the frontyard as agreed, with Jocelyn, Amelia and Carol having tagged along. While Sara gets a few good hits in, it's Lewis who has the upper hand throughout most of the fight. When Sara tries to catch Lewis off-guard with Hellfire Grenade, he stops time to avoid the attack, countering with several strikes while time is frozen. When he resumes time, all the strikes deliver their impact cumulatively and simultaneously, knocking Sara into a tree. Lewis assumes this means he wins, but Sara gets up. Her hair and irises have changed color and she rapidly turns the fight around. It is however interrupted by Jocelyn, who was disturbed by Lewis time ability and attacks him in anger. Sara blocks Jocelyn's attacks and tells her to calm down. Jocelyn collapses shortly after. The group carries Jocelyn away together, when Sara suddenly drops to her knees. Her hair and eyes also return to their normal color, and starts panting heavily. Despite the panting, she tells everyone she's fine, telling them that this always happens when what she dubs "Super Saiyan" wears off. After the group carries both her and Jocelyn back to their room, they are immediately met with a worried Natalie. Sara informs Natalie of what happened, adding that Lewis won, though Lewis insists on calling the duel a draw instead. Sara is than amused by Natalie calling Lewis a meanie, a characteristic that normally belongs to Sara. Sara once again says she'll be fine, easing Natalie's worries. Sara decides to go to sleep, still worn out from the fight.

Chapters covering these events:
 * "New and Awkward"
 * "Fighting Till Fatigue"

The First Stage
Three weeks after Sara's duel with Lewis, she is doing her morning exercises when Darklaw announces through the speakers that the students need to gather in the Main Hall. There, she and the others meet the eccentric Sergel. After he leaves, nobody is enthused by having met him, Sara included. She discusses the less-than-stellar meeting with the others. Darklaw then starts speaking, up on the podium. She announces an event called the Talent Showdown, exclusive to First-Year students. She goes on to explain that after a Criteria Event, four student will be chosen to represent Lorecraft Academy to battle Kings and Queens Academy. Sara and Carol are both ecstatic about this.

At lunch, Sara is complaining about her classes' difficulty. She discusses the Talent Showdown event with the others, and in the end it's Sara, Lewis, Carol and Natalie who decide to participate. When Natalie later tells the others she uses Lightning Magic, Jocelyn accidentally makes a pun, which causes Sara to laugh. Carol making several puns on purpose afterwards sends Sara into even more of a laughing fit. The group leaves for their respective classes shortly after. After these classes have ended, Sara signs up for the event.

Sara is in her room hanging out with Natalie when Amelia brings in an unconscious Jocelyn. Sara immediately asks what happened. Amelia explains that she was helping Jocelyn conquer her fear of fighting people. When Sara remarks it didn't look like it went well, Amelia adds "For both". Sara is shown a wound that Amelia has, which confuses Sara. Sara then notices Jocelyn's harp is still glowing and questions this. It then seems that Jocelyn is having a nightmare and Sara tells her to wake up. She comforts Jocelyn. Jocelyn tells Sara she doesn't want her help with getting over her fear. Sara is sad, but respects it. She then goes out to train by herself. She gets a bit carried away and has to be reminded by Natalie how late it is. She sneaks back into school and into her room, immediatelty turning in for the night.

The following Wednesday, Sara is making her way to the classroom the test will be taken. She is not looking forward to it, wanting something action-focused instead. Sara is continuously scratching her head during the test, indicating it's not going smoothly. She finishes with 50 seconds to spare. At lunch, both she and Carol are lamenting how the test went, to Jocelyn's amusement. Sara notices a weird puddle next to her. When Lewis gets up to get a wet floor sign, the puddle unexpectedly turns into Sergel, scaring the living daylights out of Lewis, who jumps into Sara's arms screaming. She catches him on reflex, only to throw him off of her immediately after. Sergel tries to work his charms on Sara but fails, between Sara being oblivious and Lewis hitting him with the wet floor sign, which causes Sergel to skurry off. Everyone seems relieved that Sergel's left. In her room, Sara lies on her bed with a worried look on her face. Her thoughts indicate she fears failing the test. When Jocelyn asks her about it, Sara plays it off, saying not to worry. The three girls living in this room go to sleep son after.

The next morning, Sara is not doing well. Her hair is a mess, she looks extremely tired and barely pays any attention to what's happening around her. Jocelyn tries to bring her a cup of coffee, but Sara just lets it fall out of her hands, dropping to the floor herself afterwards. Jocelyn then tries holding a frozen pencil holder in Sara's face. She then uses telepathy to shriek incredibly loudly in Sara's head, which finally gets her going. Lewis insists the three girls call in sick for the day. Sara objects initially, but not having slept well renders her unable to do much. After a while, Sara hears Jocelyn singing in Celestial, and Sara speaks to her in that language. The demon voice inside Natalie then addresses Sara. She responds with animosity. The demon reveals some more information, though it is contradictory to what Sara knows from earlier encounters. She ultimately decides to trust the demon for now, though she remains cautious. The demon leaves, and Jocelyn asks Sara if she knows of a way to fix Natalie's glasses. She analyzes them, noting that they're in a bad shape.

After classes, there is a knocking on the door to Sara's room. It's Sara who opens the door, greeting Lewis and an unfamiliar face, who introduces himself as Proto. When Jocelyn and the boys are in conversation, Sara barges in, complaining about being ignored. Sara confirms to Lewis she's recovered. After Lewis and Proto leave, Jocelyn follows after them. The next thing Sara sees is Jocelyn tripping and falling into the room, Proto entering the room as well shortly after. Sara is confused by this, and when Jocelyn panickingly yells to Proto to not say "it", Sara asks what is going on. Jocelyn seems like she's going to explain, but runs away instead. Sara tries to give chase, only to be stopped by Proto. Sara gets upset that Jocelyn doesn't want to explain. She loses control over her emotions, and in her anger and confusion she aggressively pins Proto to a wall, demanding him to tell her why. Proto insists he can't. He fights off both her and Lewis, and after creating a cloud of darkness, he escapes. Sara is left in the room, sitting on the ground and sobbing, Lewis comforting her.

Abilities
In battle, Sara uses gymnastics to fight, coupled with close-range Fire Magic. Sara does not use weapons in battle. This makes her fighting style very melee-based, though she can also use Fire Magic to attack from range. She also has a tendency to give nearly all of her attacks names.

Attacks
Note: All named attacks are attacks named by Sara
 * Fire Fist: A strong, powerful punch engulfed in flames.
 * Blaze Kick: A sideways swinging kick, with flames accompanying her kicking leg.
 * Fireball Barrage: Sara rapidly fires fireball after fireball.
 * Hellfire Grenade: Follow-up attack to Fireball Barrage. Sara keeps all fireballs in place, then sends all of them directly at the target.
 * Missile Kick: Sara cartwheels onto her hands and launches herself towards her opponent, feet forward.
 * Rapid Spin: Sara jumps to a surface perpendicular to the ground. She then launches herself using her legs. She then starts spinning her body as she travels in mid-air, crashing into her opponent at great speed, the attack gaining additional power due to the velocity of Sara's spinning.
 * Heat Wave: Fires off a wave of fire parallel to the ground in the shape of a cone.
 * Stream of Fire: Sara streches her arms forward, her wrists are touching and her fingertips are fully stretched outwards, firing a huge stream of fire forwards.

Resonance
Sara's Resonance is an ability that allows her to tap into a latent power inside her. While she does this, her hair and eye color change. Sara refers to her Resonance as "going Super Saiyan". Her personality also shifts somewhat, becoming slightly more mature and level-headed.

Battles

 * Lewis vs. Sara (Chapter 6)
 * Result: Draw (Though Sara insisted Lewis won)
 * Sara vs. Lamia (Chapter 19)
 * Result: Win
 * Sara and Lewis vs. Alraune (Chapter 19)
 * Result: Win
 * Sara and Carol vs. Hunt and Meryl (Chapter 21)
 * Result: Win
 * Sara vs. Lillian (Chapter 22)
 * Result: Win
 * Sara vs. Jocelyn (Chapter 25)
 * Result: Win
 * Sara and Amelia vs. Umiko (Chapter 26)
 * Result: Loss

Trivia

 * Sara's last name is a reference to Madame Butterfly.
 * Chapter 16, the only chapter to have Sara's name in the title is the only chapter in which Sara does not make a physical appearance.
 * Many of Sara's battle-related names are references:
 * Super Saiyan is a reference to the famous Super Mode in Dragon Ball Z.
 * Blaze Kick and Rapid Spin are both names of moves from the Pokémon series.
 * Hellfire Grenade is a reference to the attack named Hellzone Grenade, another reference to Dragon Ball Z.