Part I, Chapter 8, Aomame Summary

Aomame visits an old, Western-styled home called Willow House. There, she sees Tamaru, a professional bodyguard. He takes her to see the Dowager, who is working in the hothouse full of butterflies and plants. The dowager talks about butterflies as her nameless friends who live and die as if they had never existed. The dowager shows Aomame photographs of a badly beaten girl, with the understanding that the man Aomame killed, caused the beatings. Willow House is a home for such beaten women.

Aomame asks Tamaru about the police using more modern weapons, and Tamaura confirms the change occurred two years before, though Amome cannot remember any of it.

Part I, Chapter 8, Aomame Analysis

Aomame questions her memory with respect to the service weapon, and it is the first clue to her that something yet indescribable is...