"How long till we reach the warp point", Mamon asked the navigator. "At our current speed, we should arrive within a day, my lord", the navigator answered. "Send word out. Prepare dark matter drives. We'll be using hyper speed to reach there sooner", he commanded.
"Yes, my Lord. It shall be done", the warrior in charge of communications answered and proceeded to fulfil the command. The ships hummed as the dark matter drives slowly charged up, preparing to launch the ships forward at hyper speed.
As they braced for the G-force associated with the launch, the armada came under sudden fire, forcefully disrupting the dark matter drives and causing a backlash to mess with the ships' systems.
"What happened?" Mamon asked in alarm. "My Lord, we are taking fire from multiple directions but we are unable to identify an enemy", one of his helmsmen announced in a panicking tone. "I don't want any excuses. Just find them and wipe them out", Mamon commanded in rage.
All the ships launched counterattacks in the direction the attacks had come from but they hit nothing but empty void. Each volley of attacks from the unknown source seemed to come from different points in space every time but the deep space scans were unable to pick them up.
"Order the troupes to employ evasive maneuvers. We are sitting ducks staying in formation. We can't have our forces wiped out even before we begin our conquest", Arsenaim commanded and the helmsmen obeyed. As the order was relayed, the warships and battle ships split up in different directions but the attackers appeared to be hot on their heels.
Enraged at how easy hi troupes were falling even after all the work done in preparation for their journey, Mamon decided to take action himself. "Open the observation window!" he commanded. "Yes, my lord", a helmsman replied and the roof of the mothership's cockpit opened up revealing a large observation window.
Mamon stood from his throne and walked closer to the window. He commanded the mothership to be moved back in order to have the entre chaotic battlefield before him. Once his command was followed, he held up his hands and closed his eyes with focus.
"Revelus-zash!" he shouted and a pulse of energy spread throughout out the entire battle space, affecting each and every ship in the vicinity and causing them to glow. In multiple points surrounding the armada, there were several dozen glows that showed the outlines of strange vessels.
"There they are…have the ships fire on them and wipe them out", Mamon commanded as he returned to his throne. He wheezed loudly, trying to catch his breath as blood streamed out of his nose. 'I used too much of my mana at once', he thought to himself as he sat on the throne.
"Are you alright father?" Arsenaim asked. "I'm just a little bit exhausted. Focus on the battle", Mamon commanded as he wiped the blood from his nose. "Yes father", Arsenaim replied and turned back to give out orders.
Although they could now see their attackers, it still took a considerable number of time and ships to take one down as the attackers were insanely agile, and with their smaller sizes, made it difficult for the battle ships with bigger guns to lock on them.
It took close to an entire day before the battle was concluded and all the attackers were wiped out. "Damage report", Mamon requested of his helmsmen.
"Sir, the attack took out of close to ninety percent of the A-class and B-Class warships and sixty percent of the C-Class and D-Class battleships. Because of their stronger defenses, the E-Class battleship and the mothership barely suffered any critical damage. In conclusion, we've had a casualty rate of almost forty-five percent of our entire forces", the helmsman reported, stepping back as Mamon's face boiled with rage and he screamed in anger destroying the armrest of his throne.
"What do we do now father? Do we retreat and regroup?" Arsenaim asked his wrathful father. "No! We move forward with the journey. No more delays. We will destroy any obstacle in our path without mercy. We can't let our pride be trampled on time and time again. We must strike now and wipe away that measly little pile of dirt called a planet", Mamon spat out.
"Yes father. Your wish is my command", Arsenaim said with a bow before turning to the helmsmen. "Salvage whatever we can from the wrecks, then restore all dark matter drives and get us back on course", he commanded. "Yes, your highness. It shall be done", they replied and quickly got to work conveying the instructions to the other warships and battleships.
"I'm coming for you Earth, and there is nothing you can do to stop me. You hear me…nothing!!" Mamon declared loudly as the ships shot off at hyper speed towards the vacuum of deep space.
...…..
"We've lost all the probes but since we have the data from the battle, we can do further analysis and come up with something else. Fortunately, we were also able to reduce their numbers greatly. We should have an easier time with their numbers now', Emmanuel said to the group as they sat in the war room observing the video feed sent by the last of the probes.
"I did not anticipate the level of his power. The probes being revealed so easily could have been avoided if we had placed a spell reflecting barrier on them. We could have done so much more damage", Ang-Streum commented.
"If I'm right, the very act of revealing all those probes at once should have taken a massive toll on Mamon. He always had people to do things for him and never grew his mana reserves. We should consider this a win!" Judicara countered in an assuring manner.
"She's right. Besides, we can't change the past. We need to look to the future and win the upcoming battle", Samuel added and the group nodded in agreement. "On that note, it's time for the second phase of this battle", Samuel declared menacingly.