Submitted Question: […] there wasn’t a solid explanation for [the orange butterflies], which is bugging me. Do you have any ideas on what they could’ve meant?

The question in full can be seen below the cut, as well as an answer.

Hello! So I was thinking recently about Testa Rossa, and I just remembered that when it reached its Vermillion Apocalypse form, it summoned what looked like glowing orange butterflies. As far as I can remember, there wasn’t a solid explanation for them, which is bugging me. Do you have any ideas on what they could’ve meant? My mind is wandering towards Enforcer 3 (the Gold Butterfly, if I’m not mistaken) but I’m not really sure.

Yotaka:

My own speculation (and it’s just that) is that the butterflies are (or started out as) an interface for the Sept-Terrion of Fire. The two treasures we know a lot about each had such an interface through which they extended their power, the Gospel devices for Aureole and the Pleroma Flowers for Demiourgos. The latter in particular are significant because they grow above septium veins. Similarly, when Vermillion Apocalypse awakens it activates the veins all around Heimdallr and turns them crimson… and it’s with these veins that the butterflies appear in huge numbers. I think that the activation of Testa-Rossa might have ‘woken up’ the butterflies in a similar manner that the approaching completion of Azure Demiourgos caused the Pleroma Flowers to start blooming madly in Ao.

Regarding the link between the butterflies and Enforcer III, my guess is that rather than having a direct connection they’re simply both drawing upon the same symbolism that the butterfly has, representing the soul, sometimes death and (important here) in large numbers they’re seen as an ill omen in Japan. The Enforcer as an ex-assassin is intimately associated with death, so that might be where their name comes from.