[center][h3]Uncharted Space, Arcadia[/h3][/center]

A flash appeared in the dark night sky of Arcadia momentarily, looking like just another star while it was there. It disappeared in a mere second, leaving behind only the question of what it was. A few minutes later, the northern hemisphere of Arcadia would witness a shooting star, a single object shining thanks to the plasma that charred it's surface as it fell down from the sky. It seemed like an insignificant meteor, doomed to a fiery death in the atmosphere, but the few awake in a small town would know that it had no such fate.

It continued falling through the sky, revealing itself to be a saucer-like craft as it cast a shadow on the town from above. It flew towards a nearby forest, ramming straight into the trees and running them down with barely a scratch on its graphene hull. As its bow hit the ground first, it flipped over multiple times before finally coming to a rest against a large hill outside of town. A flag was painted on the side facing the town, the impact having scratched off some of the paint, it looked like a flag that had been intentionally torn apart.

From the charred and broken spacecraft, a single woman crawled. She was wearing a white and gold uniform, a circular patch on her right shoulder and a red armband on her left arm. Her uniform was torn almost to shreds, a large piece of it dangling off of her stomach to reveal a gash from which red Abh blood spilled. Her hair was a long mass of dark blue, matted by the blood of her comrades. A piece of ornately shaped metal was embedded in her left arm, sticking through her armband. With one hand she clutched her shoulder and with the other she held her katana.

Despite her injuries, the stood up against the gravity of Arcadia, walking towards the town. Apparently, her seemingly dainty figure held surprising strength. Standing up after thank kind of crash was not an easy thing to do, and yet she even carried a weapon with her. However, her strength couldn't hold out for long, and she only got as far as the entrance to the town. There, she collapsed, not sure if anyone could see her due to the extent of her injuries. 

She spoke, her voice weakened greatly, but still strong enough to be heard.

"Demons... servants of Draka... you... will... fail..."

[center][h3]Kibō-hosh, Ground Battle[/h3][/center]

While the Knightmares easily crushed any Abh unit that dared to challenge them, the Roman Imperial Guard and Legions that were charging soon discovered their folly. The Abh, though almost identical in stature, were immensely more powerful than the Romans. For every Abh that fell, two Romans did the same. The Space Marines seemed to be the only units that didn't need to use specialized tactics against the Abh. Unfortunately, the Abh could easily use specialized tactics against them. To the Abh, the planet had low gravity, and thus they could leap much higher than the roman troops. Using the urban setting to their advantage, they jumped from one building to the next, opening fire on the marines from above with RPGs.

When faced with the Knightmares, however, the Abh retreated further into the city. They continued to be pushed back, past the impossibly tall skyscrapers held up with antigravity technology. Still, they refused to surrender. Surrender meant dishonor, and death was a preferable alternative to dishonor.

The Abh tanks attempted to take down the Knightmares at first, but all attempts were met at failure due to their immensely superior mobility. They instead concentrated on the Roman armored divisions, their railguns punching holes in even the Emperor Tanks thanks to the plasma coating caused by the sheer velocity of their projectiles. Meanwhile, the light tanks mowed down the enemy infantry in droves, their flamethrower-like plasma weapons causing a fitful death for anyone unlucky enough to get caught in the fire.

As the Abh retreated further towards the city's center, the battle reached the Secondary Defense Line. For whatever reason, the vast majority of the Abh forces were there. For the entirety of the battle so far, the Romans had been fighting Abh in either light exoskeletons or none at all. Now, they met the Abh defensive infantry, fully adorned in Semarri Type 2 Combat Exoskeletons. These forces were even more effective at taking down the Imperial Guardsmen and Legions, shredding them apart without any sign of mercy.

Tanks lined up all along the defensive line, alternating between heavies and lights. The lights only added to the immense losses taken by the Roman infantry, while the heavies' dual railguns sent rounds deep into the Roman armor divisions. The tanks also began to utilize their missiles, sending swarms against the Roman armor and Knightmares. Abh gunners bolstered the line with both their machine gun and railgun emplacements, only adding to the already immense death toll of the Imperial Guard. Artillery gunners situated far behind the line fired explosive shells at the Roman armor divisions, as well as incoming infantry. They made sure to avoid the buildings, however, which raised the question of just why the buildings were important.

That question was answered quite quickly.

As if they had planned to do so on their own, the windows of every building in the Roman-taken part of the city shattered. Glass shards fell onto the advancing Romans, bouncing off of the helmets of soldiers and the armor of tanks as they littered the streets, reflecting the events above. Like an Ōkamaka pack descending on their prey, a hail of bullets and missiles fell upon the Romans marching to the battle at the Defensive line. An army of Abh could be seen through the smashed windows, mowing down the Roman troops with ruthless efficiency.

These Abh didn't look the same as the soldiers, and only a few wore the same combat armor. Most wore no armor, and just white military uniforms. Quite a few wore uniforms one wouldn't see on the ground, Spaceborne Navy, Sea Navy, Airborne Forces, all of them were represented. Yet more of them wore green camo and outdated armor, and some wore ancient plate and chainmail armor over their uniforms, quite obviously knowing it was useless against the Roman weaponry.

Their weapons varied just as much, though the majority wielded the same weapons as the main force, there was certainly quite a bit of deviation. Some of them were carrying black powder weapons, outdated, but nonetheless effective. Many carried RPGs and railguns, though the railguns were vastly rarer. The RPGs, meanwhile, differed greatly in appearance, many of them using black powder instead of acceleration coils. Even so, the ammo of the RPGs was what mattered most, and everyone was supplied with standard issue explosives. A few of the older troops, presumably veterans, were equipped with miniature antimatter explosives for the purpose of taking out larger targets.

The Abh troops in the buildings were taking cover behind sandbags set up before the ambush, confirming that it was clearly planned far head of time. Behind the sandbags, more Abh wearing civilian clothing could be seen. They were cowering in fear, many of them begging the gods to let them live. The Abh positions would be completely useless if the Romans chose to take down the building, and it was clear that they let the civilians be seen in order to stop the Romans from doing so. Most species would call it dishonorable, of course, to the Abh, it was anything but.

[center][h3]Kibō-hosh, Air Battle[/h3][/center]

Originally, only a few fighters had been dispatched to deal with the Roman Knightmares. However, after they had easily torn apart the unsuspecting first defense line and everything thrown at them, they decided to take a different tactical stance. On the other side of the city, Abh airships launched off of their landing pads, marking the first time the Romans had ever seen them. The Romans must have been intimated, having never constructed such giant aerial vessels. An entire fleet of aerial battleships moved forward, firing rounds down at the Roman armor as they advanced. As they got into range of the Knightmares, all hell broke loose.

Countless flak explosions appeared in the sky, concentrated around the Knightmares. The AA guns on the battleships fired constantly in tandem with their railguns, which fired with such power that they slightly rocked the ships. Having come into range of the Roman forces outside of the city, mortars on the battleships started shelling them, refusing to let any Roman live. From behind the battleships, another fleet approached, These ships were clearly made under a different design philosophy, and echoed the designs of oceangoing vessels. Airborne fighters launched from the vessels, taking off from the large, flat flight deck that spanned the entire length of each ship.

The fighters swarmed the Knightmares, missiles coming in torrents as they approached. Having expended their missiles, they opened up with coilgun fire, using their overwhelming numbers to defeat the Knightmares. The carriers also started firing their AA cannons, adding to the massive bombardment that was constantly tearing into the ten Knightmares. However, they made it a point to stay away from this fire, and thus kept a safe distance from the Knightmares.

AA guns on the ground also began to fire on the Knightmares, the Abh apparently unsatisfied with even the statistical possibility that anything could survive existing. However, they were also quite sure that the absolutely ludicrous amount of fire being put on them would be able to take down the Knightmares, and thus a few of the guns began to fire on any landing craft still coming down. Since the Romans refuse to fight any "civilians" as they seemed to call non-combatants, they hadn't bombed the weaponry and military bases in the middle of the city, which was where most were anyways. Obviously, this allowed the Abh to have the advantage despite the Knightmares.

[center][h3]Kibō-hosh, Naval Battle[/h3][/center]

The quite respectable Abh fleet in the docks of the capital city was almost certainly the best post to have during the battle. As the Romans had neglected to bring any naval forces whatsoever in their invasion, the Abh held complete and absolute naval superiority. It was a massive folly on the part of the Romans, likely because they didn't expect a navy at all. And if there was anything the Abh knew how to do, it was how to take advantage of the enemy's folly.

The carriers launched yet more fighters to attack the Knightmares, adding to the excessive overkill that was focused on them. All the ships opened up with AA fire as well, the Abh most certainly believing in being thorough. Every railgun in the fleet started firing on the Roman forces on land, explosive rounds landing across all of the Roman army. With no substantial airforce to speak of, and no units to deal with the navy, the invasion was starting to look bleak. An orbital bombardment would likely solve all of their problems, as well as preserving the resources they were fighting for, but the question was: were they willing to stoop to the level of their enemy?

They would likely have little choice. The Abh were fighting for their homes, all the Romans were fighting for was a bunch of useful rocks.

[center][h3]Tsutā System[/h3][/center]

A Kyūsei House battleship picked up the alien message in the midst of a flurry of radio broadcasts. Most were propaganda for the war, calling for anyone that didn't sign up to donate everything they could to the war effort. Since Abh warships were armored in graphene, the vast majority of materials sufficed. Of course, the best donation the army could get was a personal starship. The richer families of the Empire owned personal vessels which were usually stripped for valuable parts, then scrapped and used to build new ships. However, a few survived the process and ended up as command vessels behind the lines ("command" referring to the tacticians onboard that would give advice to the actual commander, who would would be found charging into battle, of course).

Excited by the prospect of getting assistance in the war, the battleship quickly sent a message to the capital planet of the system to inform them of a gap in the patrol routes. It then immediately diverted course to the coordinates specified by the message, "ascending" into the fifth dimension to reappear at the rendezvous location less than a second after they left.

[center][h3]Outpost 12, Common Deck of the Honōnoransu[/h3][/center]

"Well met, honorable people of the Holy Dominion of C'ran." Responded Laidach, smiling softly at their returned bow, it being something nobody expected (aside from them being aliens, the return of a bow depends on social stature, and bowing back to someone of an equal or lower rank is usually considered condescending). The name was pronounced surprisingly well, with even the accent being replicated as well as possible. "We never knew that there were explorers in the stars. To continue your analogy, we thought there was only darkness. We are [i]incredibly[/i] happy to know that there is light! This is the first time one of us has spoken with another species, so please excuse any mistakes we might make. Many of our people wished for exploration after the colonization of our fifteenth system, but ever since the first attempt at making contact, we've been engaged in a war, as you saw here. After that, nobody wanted to explore anymore."

Funnily enough, the young man appeared to be resisting an impulse to bow a second time. Unbeknownst to the aliens, Socal House traditions were essentially the reverse of the common ones, with bowing last being a sign of servitude. The Socal rulers always bowed last to their subjects, showing that they served them.