SonSon II/Stage 7



This stage is fairly linear. In order to reach the final boss of the game, you will be forced to challenge most of the bosses you faced to this point. From where you begin, you can backtrack a bit to the left to find some pots which may have high-Zenny fruit in them. You'll be followed by a blue Oni. Return to the right, and watch out for a bone thrower. He's standing on a ledge with a pot behind him, and the pot contains another bone thrower. If you're not careful, you can put yourself in a situation where the bone throwing makes it difficult to avoid taking damage. A red Patapata bat waits behind them.

Watch out for the floating green peach and then approach the next ledge. A bone thrower awaits on both this ledge, and the one beyond. In addition, there's another bone thrower in one of the pots on the first ledge. Take your time clearing you way through here in order to minimize the damage. Then leap over the spikes and jump onto the small platforms. Hop across them until you reach the floating platforms, and ride them to the right.

The higher of the two platforms only leads to a smaller platform with two pots that contain fruit. If you ride on it, y ou can't see the platform below you, so you'll have to return to the left. Right the lower one as far as it goes and then leap over the spikes to the next ledge. Beware of the red plant which pops out of the ground here. Beyond the next spikes, you'll encounter a yellow plant. One of the pots around the plant likely contains a bone thrower so be careful opening them. As you leap over to the small pillars, a key will be visible in an alcove on the right. However, if you leap close to it, a red plant will pop out of the ceiling above it. You can lure the red plant out and then attack it from the safety of the pillar before collecting the key. After you grab the key, climb up the pillars. Hop off to the left. The pot closest to you contains a Daruma, but the pot on the small ledge above it typically contains a strawberry. Beyond this pot, you'll find Cho Hakkai, and he's running a shop. Unless you know that you have all five hits left in a fist, purchase a new fist which you will need later. Even if you have a maxed out health meter, buying the Yashichi for 3000 Zenny will give you back four bars

Once you're done, return to the right and carefully jump across the pillars (you'll have to move carefully to catch the center pillar). Once you're on the other side, ignore the enemies and rush to the right in order to collect the POW and clear away all of the enemies surrounding the door. Pass through the door to be sent to the first two boss battles.



When you first arrive here, watch out for a red Oni which approaches you from the right. Then turn around and deal with the Amajin on your left. Be careful of the pot farthest on the left as it usually contains a Daruma. Start climbing up the ledges to the right. Watch out for a blue Oni on the way up, and a red plant that sprouts at the top.

Simply drop down to the ground below and continue right. Watch out for the Amajin on the ground. After you defeat him, you'll encounter an open door. If you ignore this door, you'll come to the locked door of this section, but you have yet to find the key that unlocks it. The key can be found by passing through the previous door first, which takes you to the section below.

As soon as you arrive, a woman to your left explains how your staff length increases with each level. Start moving to the right, and defeat the blue Daruma. Beyond that, a Sutegon will begin to approach you. Instead of engaging the Sutegon, hop up to the pillar and climb up just high enough to jump into the tunnel in the middle of the wall to the right. Walk to the end and strike the wall to discover the best staff in the game, the Level 6 Staff. Watch out for the Sutegon on the floor below before dropping down and heading to the right. A red plant will sprout on the ceiling of the tunnel that you run through. It's best to ignore it and continue on to the door. Pass through the door, and you will arrive in the area shown to the right. Inside, you'll find a shop keeper. At this time, it is an extremely good idea to buy a gourd if you don't already have one, and spend however much Zenny is necessary to fill your health meter. Be aware that the price of a large heart will rise 500 Zenny which each purchase, but it's worth it. More importantly, investigate the wall behind the shop keeper. If you have a full fist, you can break open part of the wall. The next wall behind it is fake, but you must destroy the third wall. Walk over to it and you will drop down another fake wall. Break the last two walls to the right, and you'll encounter Sagojo. If you managed to trade the Meat Bun with Cho Hakkai for the cucumber in ../Stage 4/, Sagojo will happily take the cucumber and give you the Magic Clothes in return. The Magic Clothes reduce the damage you take, so they are extremely valuable.

Once your done here, return through the door. The Sutegon will be waiting for you. There's little you can do to avoid getting hit by it, it has too much health to destroy before you reach the end of the ledge. Get struck by it and use the resulting invulnerability to return to the left. Begin climbing up the pillars, but watch out for the spinning coin. Climb up to the top, and jump off to the ledge on the right.

There are two bone throwers at the top that you'll have to deal with. Ignore the pots for now and run to the right to claim the POW that's waiting on the next ledge. It will clear some enemies. Then return to the pots and collect the items they contained, including a key to the door outside. From here, you can either return to the left to get back to the outside, or you can continue all the way to the right, as this section wraps around. There are some high-Zenny fruit to collect to the right, but it's generally not worth the extra effort. Save your health and return to the left. If you really want to, you can leap across the pillars to the left side and collect the other POW waiting on that side as well, before dropping backdown and exiting through the door.

Back outside, watch out for some floating Baras, and continue on to the locked door. Open it up to pass through and continue to the next set of boss fights.

After you defeat Gin Kaku, you will arrive at the top of the area shown to the right. As soon as you arrive, you can jump up to collect the strawberry. Then you have a decision to make: left or right. Either way that you go, you will be able to collect a key, a floating green peach will harass you, and a heart will be over a locked door. If you choose to go left, you will find a small heart over the door, and the door will lead to combat against Kin Kaku. However, if you choose to go right, there will be a large heart over the door, and this door will take you to a chamber with Rasetsu. You must decide which boss you feel more comfortable fighting. One word of caution: no matter who you pick, if you don't have the level 6 staff, then you must end the fight with approximately five bars of health due to the fact that you will get struck by a Sutegon before you are able to destroy it.



No matter who you fought, you will end up on the right side of the hallway shown above. Two Sutegons will approach you. If you have the level 6 staff, you can finish off the first Sutegon before you reach the wall. Otherwise, there is so little room between you and the Sutegon that the only way to avoid getting hit by him is to use time magic to stop him. If you have enough health, you can suffer the damage, walk through him to the other side, and finish him off. The is one other Sutegon behind him, but this time, you have enough room to defeat him before he can touch you. On the other side of both Sutegons is the key, and one final shop keeper. As expected, you should buy as many large hearts as possible in order to maximize how much health you have going into the final battle. A gourd is highly recommended. Scrolls are only worthwhile if you plan to use magic. Once you are done shopping, turn around and return to the door on the right. Once you pass through, you will arrive at the final battle.

Boss: Gyumao
When you first arrive in the room, you will encounter Gyumao who is waiting for you on the right side. He will speak with you a bit before the fight begins. Then he will launch into his attack. He will basically walk back and forth, and his only weak point is his head. Occasionally, his horns will flash. When this happens, a pair of fireballs will appear from his horns and spiral toward you. If you jump high before they appear, they will sail over your head when you land. Otherwise, you may need to jump up in order to avoid them.

Once you have done enough damage to Gyumao, he will begin to explode as if the battle is complete. However, only Gyumao's body disappear. His head remains in tact and begins to attack. It moves slowly towards you, bobbing up and down, and picking up momentum as it travels. When the head gets within a certain range of SonSon, it swoops down to attack. This attacks takes the head to the other side of you, and it must overcome this momentum before it truly starts to chase you again. Use this to your advantage to attack it from a safe distance before it renews its approach. Do your best to jump up and attack it from as far away as possible while still hitting him. Back up as you attack so that you can go as long as possible before the head swoops down again. Eventually you will damage the head enough that it explodes. You will then rescue Sanzo Hoshi, and the ending will begin. Congratulations.