For the strategies I used there is only one required charm you'll need per fight these are:

For the Ziying fight you'll need the Little fly's Helmet charm to give you invulnerability during your dash


For the Shadow fight you'll need the Small Whelk charm to give you more mana when you hit the boss



These help with survivability by either helping you live longer or dealing more damage they are:

The Huge Hammer to deal more damage with your sword


The Eternal Stone to get rid of the knockback when you're hit


The Wooden Jujube to double the healing received from your gourds


The Voodoo Doll's Head to increase the damage from your fireballs

The Little Fly's Helmet makes you invulnerable when dashing and can be found pretty early on by backtracking and breaking a wall to enter this gated off area here on the map
The Little Fly's Helmet will be sitting on the thing in the middle of the closed off room just below the lever

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The Small Whelk gives you more mana when you attack enemies with your sword and can be found after you defeat the golem boss in the area you get fireball here on the map
There is no map for inside this section but you go through this door
You should have collected this on the way out when you got fireball but if you missed it, after entering the door go right, then drop down the hole and continue right and you'll find this room containing the Small Whelk

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The Wooden Jujube doubles the amount of health restored from your healing gourds and can be found here on the map
Getting here requires the Ice ability you get after the fire golem boss and after making your way across some fireballs you need to freeze to use as platforms you'll get here where the Wooden Jujube can be collected

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The Eternal Stone gets rid of the knockback you receive when enemies hit you and can be found just after you defeat the grub boss it is here on the map
The Eternal Stone is just out of reach when entering from the grub boss' room and you'll have to go under and loop up from the left then the Eternal Stone will be sitting on the edge here

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The Voodoo Doll's Head increases the damage of your magic and can be found here on the map
To get here you'll need the wall climbing ability you get after defeating the transforming stone ball boss after climbing the wall you'll find this small tunnel with the Voodoo Doll's Head

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The Huge Hammer increases the damage dealt with your sword attacks and can be found behind a breakable wall partway through the platforming endurance section in the Forbidden Place it can be found here on the map
To reach it you will need to break the wall below the platform that the grub enemy hatches on, you'll want to jump from the wall and dash to not fall into the spike pit below, after breaking the wall the Huge Hammer will be sitting just inside here

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Little Fly's Helmet (YOU'LL NEED THIS)

Wooden Jujube

Huge Hammer

Eternal Stone

Voodoo Doll's Head

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During the fight you'll want to stay towards the middle of the arena as much as possible as some of her attacks can bounce off the wall and make it much harder, if you stay towards the middle of the arena it becomes much easier to handle


During Phase 1 she can do 5 attacks

The 1st attack she can do is to throw a fan of 3 bouncing purple kunai if you aren't too close you can just stay on the ground and they'll fly over your head, if you need to this is a safe time to heal

The 2nd attack she can do is jump up with a backflip and throw a fan of 3 bouncing kunai down towards you at a roughly 45 degree angle if you're close enough to her when she jumps you can just walk towards her and they'll miss you, if you aren't close enough for that wait and dash through them as they hit's the ground

The 3rd attack she can do is a dashing slash towards you as soon as you see her grabbing her sword just double jump over her (you can get away with a single jump but sometimes the game will give you a shorter jump even if you hold the button so I double jump to be safe) and try to land behind her as finishes, this is the most reliable damage window, get 2 hits and dash away from her. You can sometimes get away with 3 hits but this isn't safe as she can follow up with a couple of attacks you will not be able to avoid if you hit 3 times, if needed this is also a good window to heal just keep your distance when landing instead

The 4th attack she can do is a quick 3 hit sword combo that you cannot react to but this will only happen if you are close to her, if she does this just keep your distance and shoot a fireball if you have the mana or heal if you need to

The 5th attack she can do is pretty rare but occasionally if you are close enough to her she will hold up her sword in a blocking pose, if you attack her from the front during this she will instantly hit you with an unavoidable slash, if you attack from behind her she will just sit there and take it so if you can get behind her in time this is a good opportunity to get in a full 3 hit combo or if you need to heal just keep your distance, this attack is pretty rare as you need to be close enough to trigger her 3 hit combo which she seems to do more often and you want to avoid being close enough

Occasionally she will do either the 3 hit combo or blocking/retaliation move if you attack after her dashing slash attack, if this happens just keep your distance and hit her with a fireball if you have the mana or heal if you need to


Once her healthbar reaches roughly 2/3 and 1/3 she will do a phase transition attack, this is the same attack both times

When transitioning between phases she will jump away and do 3 screen wide/tall slash attack indicated by a big red line right before she does so

The first one can be vertical or horizontal as soon as she leaves just double jump up into the air and move to whatever side you have more space on, if it is horizontal you'll want to dash so you stall in the air longer if it is vertical just keep moving until she hits

The last 3 are always vertical so just run to the side and try to stay towards the middle of the arena to give yourself space to dodge her first attack after the phase transition


In phase 2 she will do the same attacks as phase 1 but she will throw 2 volleys of 3 bouncing kunai this time

If she stays on the ground and throws she will follow up with a fan of kunai toward the floor that you will have to dodge through, keep your distance and dodge through the kunai closest to her after it bounces, you will no longer have time to heal during this attack so just try to get between her and the kunai but not too close as to get hit by her 3 hit combo

If she backflips and throws kunai she will throw a 2nd volley straight ahead at the peak of her jump, nothing changes here just walk under if you're close enough or dash through the first volley as it hit's the ground, the 2nd fan of kunai shouldn't reach you unless you are too close to the wall behind you


In phase 3 she will do the same attacks as in phase 2 but now when she does her dashing slash attack she will do 2 in a row, a double jump will still keep you safe but this time you want to jump over her head during her first dash so she dashes back and stops right below you so you can get in your 2 hits in time and dash out to safety.


Following this guide you should have an easier time dealing with her

Whelk Shell (YOU WILL PROBABLY NEED THIS)

Wooden Jujube

Eternal Stone

Huge Hammer

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This boss' gimmick is darkness there are lamps that have a tiny glow around them at all times but will temporarily light up a large area around them when hit with a fireball so save your mana for lighting them

There is also an element of luck to this fight but this strategy was the best I could come up with


During this phase you can faintly see in the darkness so the lamps aren't really needed

The shadow has 3 attacks it can do

The 1st attack it can do is a large projected slash that will continue until it hits the wall, this attack can happen after either of the other attacks and can be avoided by double jumping over it, you can then land next to the shadow and get a 3 hit combo in, then immediately double jump over the middle lamp

For the 2nd attack the shadow will teleport next to you and attack you with the same 3 hit sword combo you have, this is why you try to double jump over a lamp so you can see where the shadow is when it does this, just keep your distance, you can heal here if you need to, then dash in and get 3 hits then immediately double jump into the air as it can follow this up with the large slash

For the 3rd attack the shadow will vanish and summon 5 waves of shadow ball walls from the furthest wall, each has a gap that you have to jump through through, if the shadow does not do the large slash attack after it's 3 hit combo it is doing this so get prepared to dodge them

The gap in the shadow ball wall can be on the ground, or over 1-3 shadow balls

If the gap is on the ground no need to jump and you have just about enough time for a heal if you need to

If the gap is over 1 ball tap jump to get over it, if you hold jump you can hit your head on the ball above the gap

If the gap is over 2 balls hold jump and you should fit through just fine

If the gap is over 3 balls you will have to double jump, if the following gap is over 2 or 3 balls you should dash through it otherwise you are likely to get hit

Once the boss healthbar drops to about 3/4 it will enter phase 2


At the start of phase 2 it will suck away what little light there was outside of the 3 lamps leaving it completely black outside the glow of the lamps, it will then do one of the 3 attacks it did previously

In my experience it most often did the 3 hit combo or large slash so double jump over the center lamp and if you don't see the shadow below you dash at the peak of your jumps and hope it was in the right direction to go over the big slash.

If it doesn't do the big slash immediately fire a fireball into the lamps to light them up and get ready to dodge shadow balls in an ever shrinking light area, you should hit 2 lamps which should last long enough to dodge through all 5 waves

After the shadow balls attack it can do either of the other attacks so double jump above the middle and if it doesn't appear below you dash at the peak of your jumps to try to dodge over it but you won't be able to see where it's coming from as it never seems to spawn at any of the lights when doing this so good luck

Once the boss healthbar drops to about 1/3 it will enter phase 3


At the start of phase 3 the boss will disappear and then the 2 outer lamps will disappear too so double jump over the last lamp as the boss will always start phase 3 with a 3 hit combo

The only thing that changes in our phase 3 strategy is that lighting the lamp once probably won't give you enough time to dodge all 5 waves so try to hit it with a fireball a 2nd time after the first couple of waves


The biggest luck factor in this fight is how long the shadow sticks around doing slashes and 3 hit combos since you can't do any damage during the shadow ball attack and the shadow balls are where you are most likely to get hit since they don't give alot of space to fit through or between them

With this strategy and a little luck you should defeat the shadow before long