Stage 5 – Synder, Princess of the Netherworld

The three girls flew after Eburinferuton. Leaving Hakugyokurou behind, they noticed she was flying towards a large city in the distance. Once they got near it, they couldn't help but look around in awe since they had never been to this part of the Netherworld before.

"Woah…" Marisa marveled at the sight of the large city, "Wow, where is this place?"

"This is Necropolis, the City of the Dead. It's the capital of the Netherworld, led by the current King and Queen of the Dead, the rulers of the entire Netherworld."

"But isn't Yuyuko in charge of the Netherworld?" Reimu asked with a tilt of her head, "I thought she was a princess."

"Ah, that's a common misconception by those who aren't permanent residents here," Youmu went on, "Lady Yuyuko is actually only one of 108 princes and princesses that reign over the Netherworld. Lady Yuyuko is… The fifty-sixth, I believe?" she said whilst looking up with a thoughtful expression, and continued, "The King and Queen are the first. We're currently heading towards the area controlled by the twelfth princess."

"Hmmm…" Reimu nodded, "She must be Eburinferuton's godchild. Who is she?"

"Her name is Synder Ella," said Youmu, "She's one of the leaders of the Netherworld. She outranks Lady Yuyuko by a very wide margin. I don't really know her that well, but if memory serves, she and Lady Yuyuko are friends. And yet she's behind all of this. Why?"

"I don't know…" Reimu answered with a determined look on her face, "But let's find out."

The girls continued flying, eventually entering a large countryside village. They soon came across a large mansion out on the outskirts. At the front yard they found Eburinferuton about to give Synder Jin's lamp! Just as Synder was about to take the lamp, Reimu shot it out of her hands. Synder jumped back with a gasp and turned to look at them, showing them her entire body.

Synder wore a beautiful pale cornflower blue and silver ballgown with long sleeves and a pair of white opera gloves on her arms and a glittering spiked tiara on her head with blue and white leggings that ended in slippers with small heels topped with sparkly hearts. Her entire outfit, from the tiara to her slippers, was all made of glass. Her dark blonde hair was pulled up into a French twist complimented with a very light cornflower blue band with large gems on both ends of the band and diamond earrings. She also wore a simple dark blue choker around her neck. Her skin was light gray and her eyes were dark blue and glowed brightly.

"Huh? Youmu?" Synder asked in confusion, "What are you doing here? Who are your friends?"

"Oh no!" Eburinferuton gasped, "They must have followed me! Youmu can open and close the door to the Netherworld at will… I can't believe I forgot!" She turned to Synder and explained herself, "Synder, sweetie… Those two are Reimu and Marisa. I told you about them earlier, remember? They're friends of Yuyuko; the ones who I said were the ones most likely to get in your way. They must have beat Team Grimm."

"Ah… So that's who you are!" Synder said sadly, "To think, you were able to beat all four of them… You two must be very powerful. So much power… You have so much power. I'm just not sure if it's deserved."

"If it makes you feel better," spat Reimu, "we probably would've had a harder time if we didn't have Spell Card Battles with them! Anyway, it's over Synder! Give us back that lamp!"

"NO! I won't, not now, not ever! Don't you understand?! I'm doing this for us! I'm doing this to save him! I love him! And-and I know he loves me back!"

Reimu raised an eyebrow, "'He?' Who is 'he'?"

Synder gave a happy, longing smile as she went on, "Prince Leroy Charmant, the crown prince of the Netherworld! You two don't realize what a wonderful person he is. He is friendly, humble, generous, caring, protective, kind, a perfect gentleman, and best of all…" The smile on her face turned intense as her voice's tone turned husky, "He has a VERY high pain tolerance. So you see, I can't let you stop me. I won't," she gritted her teeth.

"We'll see about that! Come on, Marisa!" Reimu looked at her partner and raised her gohei, "Let's teach this princess a lesson!"

"So you won't back down, eh?" Synder narrowed her eyes, stepping forward, "In that case, I'm afraid I'll just have to show you what true power is!"

"Don't worry, sweetheart! This time, I'll assist you!"

"Be careful you two," Youmu warned her friends, "I hear Synder is very powerful! Ghosts who make her mad don't make that mistake twice!"

"Ghosts?!" Marisa smirked, "Don't worry! We ain't afraid of some ghost!"

"Yes!" Agreed Reimu, "We've fought a lot stronger than her! Now get ready, because here she comes!"

But without warning, Synder filled the room with a smoky cloud of ash that blinded the girls and caused them to cough, hack and wheeze. It was tough to see through, and they couldn't tell where Synder would attack from first.

"Agh!"

Just as that happened, Synder spread her arms and flung burning explosive shards of glass and blasts of burning hot ash at them from beyond long range.

Unable to counter it, they were forced to spread out due to the sheer number of explosions sent their way. The glass also nicked and sliced through their clothes and parts of their body, leaving them with several cuts that bled a bit.

"Rgh!" Reimu yelped as she coughed from the ash and dove out of the way of another explosion, "She really means business!"

"Ya think?!" Marisa yelled back as she fired off several bullets to clear the room of its smoke and ash.

Just then, Synder had charged at her with a spear made of glass, thrusting it at Marisa with various slashes. Marisa barely managed to avoid the strikes and had to leap backwards on her broom to get some distance. Synder responded to this by throwing glass spears at Marisa which exploded and sent the blonde witch flying!

"YIKES!"

While Synder was distracted, Reimu managed to get off a quick shot that exploded beneath Synder's feet and sent her flying into the nearest wall. Just then, Eburinferuton fired off some balls of light that Reimu had no choice but to dodge. In order to keep her occupied, she spun multiple bullets around herself before flinging them off one by one at the fairy to keep her attention.

Synder got up onto her feet and activated her first Spell Card, Midnight "Glass Carriage".

She snapped her fingers and created twelve giant explosions of hot ash from underneath Reimu and Marisa that spread outward in a ring formation. While this was happening, she made other smaller explosions of hot ash appear at random places. The two girls were able to dodge the explosions, but they also ran into balls of ashes that detached from the wall and blew up in their faces.

In the meantime, Eburinferuton continued to send electrical blasts and rays of light from afar while Synder dropped giant glass slippers down on their heads and sent volleys of glass arrows at them. Marisa thought quickly and fired off shots to counteract the explosions and send the shards of glass right back at Synder.

"Rrgh! ...Not bad. You're smarter than you look! I'm starting to see how you beat Youmu! But the prince will be mine! You have no chance!"

"Ze! What's the plan here?!" Marisa coughed in between her shouts.

"...We have to make her burn herself out. Literally," Reimu suggested, "Make her use her spell cards in quick succession so she tires herself out. That's the only way we have a chance here, Marisa."

"What about Eburinferuton, ze?!" Marisa shouted, "No way we're gonna be able ta deal with her at the same time!"

It took some deliberation, but Reimu ultimately came up with a plan that Marisa had no choice but to agree to.

"...This is a stupid idea, but whatever…" Marisa grumbled as she flew towards Synder, "Hey, Synder, over here!"

"Grrgh!"

Synder fired off still more blasts of ash and glass towards Marisa, but the witch would narrowly avoid them while conserving her own power. Every time Eburinferuton would fire off a bolt of light, Reimu was there to counter them with her own bullets to detonate them in mid-air. Soon enough, it worked.

"Stop getting in the way of my love!" Synder screamed and immediately activated her next Spell Card, Midnight "Glass Ball Gown". Throwing up her hands, she summoned up a massive cloud of ashes filled with white hot cinders that followed them around. While this happened she hid in many smaller clouds of ash that bounced around shooting blobs of molten glass at you. But the two girls spotted the one she hid herself away in, the fastest-moving one, and blasted it away, knocking her out of it and stopping the attack.

Arms of ash and glass arrows flew from the cloud in all directions, followed by multiple explosions of hot ash. Reimu and Marisa conserved their power and focused entirely on dodging her attacks for the moment just to waste Synder's Spell Card usage. There was simply no way for them to fight back at the moment, so they had to wait it out.

Just at that moment, Synder used another Spell Card, this one being Midnight "Glass Horses".

Disappearing into a swirling vortex of ash, hundreds of hands made of compressed embers flew at them. While this happened the vortex sucked them in as well as small ash twisters. They were able to dodge the hands and ash twisters but this soon stopped and a huge serpent of ash flew at them and exploded when it hit the ground.

This gave them a clear shot at Synder and they moved in for the kill, but Eiburinferuton was in front of them and unleashed a huge web of lightning that knocked them away, causing them to fall and land on a huge plate of solid glass that wasn't there before. They looked at each other, wondering if it was another Spell Card.

And it was indeed another Spell Card, this one being Midnight "Glass Castle". Hands of glass began to rise from the floor and grab at them, but they flew up and Reimu quickly shattered the glass with her Holy Relic "Yin-Yang Kishin Orb" Spell Card before anything else could happen.

In the end, they were able to make her miss enough times to where Synder cried out in frustration and in her rage summoned massive ash twisters around her arms that she tried to grab at them with.

"Grrgh! How are you so quick?! I'm starting to see why poor Yuko had such a hard time with you!"

"It's working, ze," Marisa whispered to Reimu, "I think we can keep tiring her out if we keep this up!"

Soon enough, Synder decided she had enough and activated her next Spell Card, Midnight "Glass Tower".

She raised her arms and head and created a gigantic blob of molten glass and made it release hordes of mice, birds and stones of molten glass that all charged at them. The mice crawled up ash walls and the birds flew towards them through the air as the stones fell on their heads. Reimu and Marisa had to fire all that they had at them to avoid being overwhelmed. Slowly but surely, they were able to counter most of them with enough danmaku to explode the entire area around them, but the glass shards just reformed into the blob and Synder tossed the thing right at them, causing it to explode, sending shards flying everywhere.

The dust started to settle and the two girls landed on the ground, breathing heavily due to the dense smog.

"...Did… …We do it?" Marisa asked.

"...I have a feeling…" Reimu muttered, "...We're almost there."

"THAT'S IT!" Synder screamed, now fully enraged at this point, "I've had it with you insolent children getting in the way of my marriage! THIS ENDS NOW!" And she got ready to activate her Last Word Spell Card.

"...I think that's our answer," Marisa took a step back, "...What should we do, ze?"

"I'll tell you what you should do: GIVE UP!" Synder interrupted them. And so she activated her last Spell Card, Midnight "Glass Slippers".

The face of a giant clock suddenly appeared on the floor beneath the girls. The clock's hands would begin to tick and spin so they had to avoid it by jumping over and flying above it. Every time it passed a number, hordes of glass shards flew at them and every time it reached 3:00, 6:00, and 9:00, it released three waves of flying glass slippers, with an extra wave added for every three hours it passed. sound, the middle of the clock releases twelve waves of glass slippers and it vanishes. But once it finally struck midnight…

BONG! BONG! BONG! BONG!

A swarm of molten glass slippers flew out towards them and shattered in midair. The girls had to think quickly. Reimu fired off a swarm of bullets to counteract them in midair as Marisa fired off a series of her own to bounce off of the nearest wall and stop Eburinferuton's attacks before they could reach either of them.

In the end, they overpowered her with their explosive blasts and destroyed the clock before it could do anymore damage, leaving Synder exhausted. Synder stumbled back and fell to the ground but got up, dusted herself off and glared at them.

"It's over, Synder!" Reimu shouted, "No more games…Give us back the lamp NOW! You clearly don't get how dangerous genies can be!"

Synder was shaking on the floor as she fell to her knees and screamed, "No… I don't believe you… I DON'T BELIEVE YOU! I won't give up! I'll NEVER give up! I-I just need some help, that's all! TAKE THIS!"

Synder created an explosion of ashes in front of her that covered a large area. When the dust settled, Synder and Eburinferuton were gone.

"Gah! Not again! Marisa! Cast another tracking spell! Quickly!"

"Got it, ze! …There! I've found her, go after her!"