Rale Valley Mall

Spirit Guard Serenity battles Day LaMode at a food court in Rale Valley Mall.

**Rale Valley Mall** is a location in *Magical Girl Policy*. It is a popular shopping mall in Kessia City, and is the largest mall in the state.

## Description

Rale Valley Mall is a very large, two-story building housing numerous stores. Some of its facilities include a food court with a large fountain, a movie theater connected to an exit, and countless boutiques with large windows prominently displaying mannequins in featured products. Being very popular and the biggest mall in the state, it can be crowded even on days with relatively low traffic.

## Notable places

* **Dungeon Direct:** A shop selling comic books and other nerd-demographic items. It also hosts events such as tournaments for the *Invokers* card game. The place is usually rather messy and disorganized, especially after hosting an event. Cory and Eli have frequented this shop since middle school and are familiar with the employee Devon. Cory, Eli, and Robert stop here shortly before Day LaMode appears.
* **Current Subject:** A store in a chain that features apparel and other items based on popular culture. Robert, Cory, and Eli stand their ground here and stall Day LaMode until the Spirit Guard arrive.
* **Kickers:** A shoe store. Robert goes here to grab his Spirit Stick and transform into Spirit Guard Serenity to save Spirit Guard Tenacity from Day LaMode.

## History

### Background

Cory Frost and Eli Drake became regular customers at the Dungeon Direct comic shop as middle schoolers, where they would typically buy *Invokers* cards and play in tournaments for the game. Through this, they became familiar with the employee Devon.

### Week 1

Day LaMode is planted at a store in the mall, disguised as an ordinary mannequin. With her ability to possess any mannequin in the area, she can quickly and quietly move about to drain Investiture from passersby.

Cory and Eli head to Dungeon Direct with their roommate Robert Dreese, with the presence of a new friend accompanying the pair surprising Devon. Rob buys the latest issue of *Collider* while Cory gets *Invokers* cards. Rob finds Angela and Mallory outside, who were on a shopping trip with Vivian and Kara, but split up to search for the source of the unusual hums around the mall they started feeling with their empathokinetic perception. Having sensed this hum himself, Rob offers to help in the search in case the hum turns out to belong to a monster, as while he still refuses to transform into Spirit Guard Serenity, he's not opposed to helping the Spirit Guard protect people. The girls are grateful for the offer but ask him to leave the mall, as Mallory worries that Cory and Eli will needlessly risk their lives to stand by Rob like they had when faced with Polygal.

As Robert, Cory, and Eli are about to exit the mall, the source of the humming is found to be a mannequin in a women's boutique draining Investiture from passing high school girls. The mannequin tries and fails to drain Rob in turn, which causes his Champion's glow to briefly appear. The mannequin then reveals her true form of Day LaMode and summons her mannequin army, intercepting the trio's escape so she may capture Robert for Platicore to study. The boys hole up at a Current Subject store, with Rob stalling for the Spirit Guard's arrival by letting his Ardent Resonance signal the heroes to his location while he taunts LaMode. Spirit Guard Tenacity attacks and forces LaMode to retreat to another body, while Valor carries the boys to the second floor and directs them to flee toward the food court. Felicity and Charity also arrive at this time, but the team gets separated out of their optimal formation by the sheer number of LaMode drones.

Leaving her minions to handle the Spirit Guards, Day LaMode transfers around the mall until she finds Robert again. Tenacity arrives alone and gets LaMode to focus on her instead, but is unable to keep up with the monster's speed and body transfer ability, getting brutally beaten. With Cory and Eli in tears as Tenacity's death approaches, Robert decides he's the only one who can save her life, ducking into a Kickers store to pick up his Spirit Stick. He sends his friends to escape without him so he may transform into Spirit Guard Serenity and rescue Tenacity. Serenity battles LaMode, and through her speed, invisibility, and verbal barbs, tricks the monster into charging at the wounded Tenacity and making itself open to a decisive attack. Trace had been observing the battle while cloaked with her stealth band, but flees when Serenity senses her presence and looks in her direction.

Cory and Eli exit the mall through the movie theater, and are directed by Noriko toward the HushMobile in the parking lot. There, they cooperate with Nick and Will so evidence of the group's presence in the mall can be erased. Meanwhile, the Spirit Guards regroup with Noriko and mobilize in response to the incoming police: Felicity distracts the cops with her flames for a while, Valor leaves to report to Kunapipi, Noriko disposes of evidence around the mall, and Serenity makes herself, Charity, and Tenacity invisible so the latter can be operated on. After the team's work is done, Noriko stays behind and poses as a witness to the police, then drives Cory's car back to SAU.

Later that night, Trace returns to Rale Valley Mall to retrieve Day LaMode's empathic capacitor, though her drained stealth band forces her to employ mundane methods to sneak past the police. She harvests LaMode's sizable Investiture yield, takes note of the monster's corpse and Serenity's unique fighting style, and then returns to Platicore's lair.

Rale Valley Mall closes for repairs following the destruction in the battle with Day LaMode.

### Weeks 2-4

About two weeks after Day LaMode was defeated, Rale Valley Mall is set to reopen.

## Trivia

* Prior to September 3, 2021, Chapter 28 misspelled this place as "Raile Valley Mall".