The ferocious Hipper's improved heavy cruiser licked the blood from the corners of his mouth that had not yet been wiped away, and approached his prey with murderous energy.

However, the Southampton-class light cruiser Sheffield clearly did not have the consciousness to be the prey of the German Navy, and was now immersed in the intense thrill of being able to die with a formidable opponent.

HMS Sheffield is the third ship in the Southampton class, also known as the early type of the City class.

In order to counter the Japanese superior and the American Brooklyn-class light cruisers, who had taken advantage of the loopholes in the Washington Treaty, the British Admiralty designed and built this class of treaty-type light cruisers, and like her competitors at both ends of the sea, the British equipped the most standard treaty-type light cruiser hull with maximum force.

However, the British still maintained their sanity as an old maritime power, and the rich experience they had accumulated over the years allowed them to look at the problem more calmly than those competitors.

So she didn't fill her gun barrel like the two-stage exaggerated light cruisers, but installed the maximum force configuration she could withstand while maintaining sufficient defense.

It's a pity that the British, who thought they were cunning and cunning, never thought that they had actually been tricked by those two navy rear advances.

The British Empire's always proud brain sometimes froze intermittently, she always thought that she was the only one in the world who had the power to be shameless, she obviously underestimated the level of her two students, she did not expect that the two empires that were rude and backward in her eyes were actually doing things in their respective tonnage of ships.

However, in any case, the Southampton-class light cruiser is a masterpiece in the history of British naval shipbuilding, and on the basis of a displacement of more than 9,300 tons and a full load of more than 10,000 tons, it not only has the firepower that can match that of the two class light cruisers, but also has quite complete protection, and in this respect even surpasses some treaty-class thin-skinned heavy cruisers, such as the current fleet flagship York.

By the time the York was blown off the bridge by a salvo from the Scharnhorst and the Gnessenor, the Sheffield, the elite workhorse of the home fleet, was already in combat form.

The formidable light cruiser, which was in third place in the fleet at the time, followed closely behind the Leander-class light cruiser Orion and began to turn to starboard.

In the beginning, the Sheffield, like the other warships, did not realize that the fleet had lost its command, and that the death of the fleet command at the beginning of the war was rare in the history of naval warfare in the world.

So the light cruiser still firmly obeyed the last order of the flagship, kept the fleet formation to the right, and even waited for the flagship to convey to itself the parameters of the shelling target.

But when the York, billowing in smoke, began her death loop, the Sheffield, which began to sense that something was wrong with its flagship, saw what was wrong, and the massive bridge of the flagship had been blown away.

This situation made the Sheffield a little helpless at the time, but the battleship was an elite ship that had served on home soil for a long time, and her captain, Captain Renold, was also an experienced officer.

Reno immediately began to judge the current situation of the fleet, and as the second capital ship of the fleet, Reno immediately decided that the Sheffield would immediately take over the command of the fleet.

While Colonel Reno announced his decision to his subordinates, the Orion in front of the Sheffield was being ravaged by two German battle cruisers, and the light cruiser, which had been of average performance, had been crippled in the face of two powerful enemies after only one round.

The captain of the Orion completely lost the courage to continue the fight, and before he could send a message to the Sheffield in the rear, he directly left the original course with a large loop on the left, and then dragged the billowing smoke and swayed the crooked wake towards the left rear of the fleet, leaving the Sheffield behind him in front of the two German battlecruisers that had killed the red-eyed.

The Scharnhorst let the fleeing Orion go and immediately bombarded the Sheffield mercilessly.

However, the first bombardment did not yield the desired results, and only two near-misses inflicted some minor damage on the Sheffield, which left the captain of the Scharnhorst, von. Admiral Royankram was greatly dissatisfied.

But before the admiral could complain, the Sheffield's return fire began.

Four triple turrets and twelve 152 mm guns spewed vengeful flames at the same time, and the entire 180-meter-long hull was shrouded in golden muzzle flames, and this beautiful light cruiser now looked like an angry dragon.

The Sheffield's heroic return fire left the Scharnhorst with its first substantial damage in the naval battle, which had previously been almost unscathed.

In addition to a few small holes carved out of the solid armor belt on the side by the York's 102-mm secondary guns, it was the 40-mm anti-aircraft guns on the Orion that left a bunch of bullet holes in the unarmored position of the battleship's superstructure.

The Sheffield's 152-mm shells hit the Scharnhorst's main gun A turret, the upper bridge and the starboard deck and broadside armor belt.

The 152-mm shell that hit the front of the A-main turret had nothing to do with the terrifying 355-mm armor of the German battleship turret, and had no choice but to be ejected on the spot and fell into the sea on the side of the gunwale, as the German designers expected.

And because the impact force was too strong, the fuse at the bottom of the shell was knocked out, and the shell sank obediently into the blue waters of the North Atlantic without even making a splash.

The shell that hit the upper bridge penetrated the outer armor and exploded on the left side of the compass bridge, and the shrapnel destroyed the lookout on the left side and half of the bridge, and since most of the navigation and command crews entered the lower armored bridge, it did not cause great casualties, only killing one junior officer and seriously wounding two sailors.

What is surprising is that the four sailors closest to the explosion point actually received only minor abrasions, while the officer, who was furthest from the explosion point, was shattered in the head by a piece of shrapnel, which has to make people sigh at the wonder of war.

The shell that hit the deck exploded two metres from the Starboard twin twin twin shield of the Scharnhorst, and most of the shrapnel rained down on the armor shield of the 150 mm twin twin gun.

But these things were nothing to the 140 mm thick secondary gun shield, and the sailors who were fighting hard in the secondary gun turret did not suffer any damage except for a little concussion.

However, the scattered shrapnel caused some trouble for the machine gunners who were yelling at the British battleship in the nest of the quadruple anti-aircraft machine guns behind the secondary turret, and one hapless machine gunner was seriously injured by a piece of shrapnel that grazed the secondary turret.

The reservists, who had been waiting behind the bulwark, immediately rushed into the machine gun nest and replaced the wounded machine gunner, and the wounded were carried down, and the substitutes took over the unfortunate man's post, expressing his condolences to the female families of the British naval officers and sailors on the opposite side with more majestic momentum and loud voices.

Most of the Sheffield's other shells either created a few columns of water on the surface of the sea or were bounced off by Scharnhorst's thick 350mm armor belt, and did not cause much damage to the ship.

However, the Sheffield's return fire still angered the formidable battleship.

The Scharnhorst's gunfire rained down on the Sheffield, and the Germans had corrected their ballistics, so fireballs of all sizes began to explode on the deck of the brave light cruiser.

The Sheffield had hoisted its commanding flag on its mast, and the acting flagship was sailing under the fire of the German battleships under the cāo of experienced captains and sailors.

Captain Reno commanded the ships to fight back against the Scharnhorst, and ordered the signalmen to give the final fleet orders to the other ships.

"The fleet was disbanded, and the ships immediately separated from this sea area. The ship was determined to fight until the last moment. God bless you, long live the British Empire, long live His Majesty the King, long live the Royal Navy! ”

The Sheffield swooped down on the Scharnhorst with full force in the smoke.

I didn't expect that the light cruiser would still fight to the death after being bruised all over its body, the captain of the Scharnhorst, Siegfried. Feng. Admiral Royankram couldn't help but express his heartfelt admiration.

This is the real warrior, this is the opponent worthy of fighting with him, but it is a pity that now everyone can see how huge the gap between the two sides is, this is not something that can be changed by courage alone, the fate of that battleship has already been decided at the conference table of the naval command of the Third Reich.

Seeing the Sheffield rushing towards him in a playful posture, although Feng. Royancram has the heart to take on this brave opponent, but he has more important tasks to complete.

What's more, looking at the posture of the other side, it is obvious that they are desperate, and the German Navy has not yet knighted enough to be willing to die with a brave opponent.

Feng. Colonel Royancram had spotted that an old light cruiser in the rear of the British fleet had changed course with two freighters and was beginning to turn around and retreat southeast of the battlefield, while the remaining three destroyers were approaching the Orion, which was fleeing all the way to the southwest.

The encirclement of this fleet must now be completed immediately, and the retreat of the fleeing ships must be stopped, which was the only thought in the mind of the captain of the Scharnhorst.

The Sheffield is now in Von. Colonel Royankram's eyes began to grow more and more disgusting, and he now understood the idea of the battleship, and the opponent wanted to entangle with him to delay the completion of the encirclement of the German fleet.

How could she get her way, Feng. Although Royankram appreciated the other party's behavior of abandoning himself to cover his comrades, it was absolutely impossible to succeed in trying to prevent him from completing the mission in this way.

The Scharnhorst immediately reported the movements of the British fleet to the flagship, and then fired a final salvo at the Sheffield, then turned the rudder and accelerated, and the massive hull crossed the course of Sheffield and swooped down on the British ships that were moving in a southeasterly direction.

The Scharnhorst decided to shake off the light cruiser that was struggling with her, and threw her to the Gnesenor behind to deal with it.

As soon as the Sheffield saw that the Scharnhorst was ready to break away from the battle and continue to pursue the retreating friendly ships, it knew that its plan might have been seen through by the Germans.

Seeing that the plan was about to come to naught, Captain Reno couldn't help but curse the Germans for being cowards while hurriedly ordering the battleship to turn the rudder and catch up with the Scharnhorst.

As a light cruiser, Sheffield has the advantage of speed and maneuverability, and there should be no problem catching up with the Scharnhorst, not to mention that the distance between the two sides has been reduced to more than 2,000 meters.

But before the Sheffield could turn the rudder, the shells from the Gnessenor's main guns had already fallen around her, and the light cruiser was once again shrouded in a forest of tall columns of water.

"It's over, the German shelling queue is following."

Captain Reno suddenly felt a wave of weakness in his heart, compared to the German fleet, his own side was too weak.

Looking at the Admiral Scheer behind Gneisenau, the tall mast of the Hippel following the flagship, and the huge muzzle flames that flashed from time to time in the bow, the Sheffield was already in despair.

She knew that no matter how much she fought, she would not be able to hinder the Germans, and she would never be able to turn the tragic fate of her fleet around.

Although the fate of the fleet is already doomed from the current situation, as a glorious Royal Navy soldier, he will never tolerate being tied up like this, even if he will die in battle, he must make the enemy pay the same price, and he will never give up until the last moment.

Captain Reno ordered the ship to turn the rudder, not paying attention to the attacks of the other German warships, and to charge at the Scharnhorst at full speed.

This time the assault was no longer the previous bluff, but a real assault, and Colonel Reno was determined to ram and sink the Scharnhorst.

The Gnesenor had not expected such a frantic decision from the battered light cruiser, and by the time she could react, the light cruiser had turned its bow and rushed towards the Scharnhorst.

Sensing the enemy's intentions, the Gnesenor was taken aback and began to shoot desperately at the frantically assaulting light cruiser, trying to stop her before she could inflict significant damage on Scharnhorst.

Now that she had no orders to take prisoners, she couldn't afford to watch her sister ship in danger.

The Scharnhorst, too, had the bad intentions of the approaching British light cruiser at high speed, and began to pour all the available firepower into the Sheffield.

Although the Scharnhorst had three hundred and fifty mm of armor, but von. Royankram knew very well in his heart that a large-caliber shell and a 10,000-ton cruiser were two different things.

The Sheffield had lost all of her beautiful appearance, the once sleek and neat deck was now littered with burning flames and bright red blood, the four once-majestic triple turrets were now twisted wreckage, and the tall bridge was still billowing with smoke.

The enclosed verandah of the amidship was riddled with holes, and only one of the four secondary guns on the aft side of the aft building was left on the port side, the aft mast had collapsed, and now it was leaning on the stern main gun turret, the hangar had been torn to shreds, and the two seaplanes had been burned to the ground with only charred skeletons, which were still creaking in the flames.

She was helped by the capture attempts of the Germans, whose attacks on all British cruisers until now were limited to above the waterline, and most of them were concentrated on the bridges, superstructures and turrets of the British ships.

The plan of the German Navy was to do so long as the opponent did not sink, even if it was a barge, and from the present situation it seems that the captains of the ships carried out this order completely and firmly.

As a result, the Sheffield's power system suffered little damage. The light cruiser frantically charged at the Scharnhorst at a speed of thirty knots.

Due to the proximity of the opponents, the high speed of their movements, and the obscuration of the billowing smoke from the ship, most of the blocking fire of the Gnesennor and the Scharnhorst was lost, and the huge columns of water that shot around the light cruisers further obstructed their sight.

Siegfried. Feng. Colonel Royankram felt that the situation was a little bad at this time, all the light and heavy weapons on the Scharnhorst were firing at the demonic light cruiser, the large caliber main and secondary guns were constantly falling on the opponent's surroundings and the broken hull, and the 37 mm and 20 mm machine shells were like fire snakes licking the remnants of the bridge of the British battleship, frantically strafing the opponent's deck, but all this now seemed to be a futile struggle.

Scharnhorst panicked and tried to turn the rudder to avoid orbit, but her opponent stared at her like a ghost, and no matter how much the Scharnhorst avoided orbit, the sharp razor-like bow of the light cruiser was always aimed at her.

The distance between the two sides was close to 1,500 meters, and it was rapidly closing due to Scharnhorst's orbital evasion maneuvers.

"Order the whole ship to prepare for the collision and report the results!"

Feng. Colonel Royancram roared and ordered, he never dreamed that he would be driven to such a point by a light cruiser.

"Captain! Look! Is that...... There it is...... It's the Prinz Eugen! ”

At the moment when the terrible sound of collision echoed on the bridge, the lookout also shouted frantically at the same time.

Feng. Royancram hurriedly rushed to the lookout hole on the armored bridge and looked in the direction of the lookout's finger.

I saw that on the sea filled with gunsmoke, a battleship appeared on the starboard side of Sheffield as if it had fallen from the sky, and rushed madly towards the light cruiser that was also rushing frantically at an incredible speed.

Beautiful fragments of black and white camouflage, a tall bridge, a blood-red Imperial Navy flag and a pitch-black skull flag fluttering in the wind on the mast.

"Feng. Hess, what do you want to do! ”

Feng. Colonel Royankram was stunned by what he saw.

"Oh my God! She wants to ram Sheffield! The Prinz Eugen wants to stop her! ”

One of the lieutenants reacted and shouted wildly.

There were no sailors alive on the deck of the Sheffield, and the survivors on the bridge were now focused on the target that was close at hand, and the lookouts on the deck of the bridge were now dead, so that none of the British noticed that the German heavy cruiser was rushing towards them.

The main guns of the Prinz Eugen were silent, and they swooped down on the Sheffield like a ghost ship.

Less than a hundred meters from the Sheffield's hull, the Prinz Eugen, which had been silent, suddenly sounded all its whistles, and then the sharp and piercing sound of collision from the precision announcer on the bridge resounded in the sky.

Startled by the sudden loud noise, Colonel Reno hurriedly ran to the observation hole on the starboard side of the battleship and looked out, and what came into his eyes was the sharp bow and huge turret of a huge German battleship.

"Ah, God!"

Captain Reno shuddered and let out a scream of despair.

In the next second, the bow of the Prinz Eugen slammed into Sheffield's torn body.

The damage caused by the massive impact force was felt even by the sailors on the Scharnhorst.

The piercing sound was accompanied by a violent sound of metal breaking and twisting, and the sound of shattering echoed on the surface of the sea, and Sheffield was violently moved sideways for a distance of more than thirty meters, and the waves stirred up were like a wall of water.

The bow of the Prinz Eugen was plunged a little below the bridge of the British cruiser, and the twisted bow armor plate stood up into the sky like the sharp teeth of a monster.

Everyone was stunned by the earth-shattering scene in front of them.

"Hooray!"

I don't know who started first, first one or two, then dozens, hundreds, and finally the whole battleship boiled.

The sailors excitedly waved their arms at the two battleships embedded in each other. The sailors on the deck forgot that the battle was still going on, and they jumped on their positions and roared excitedly.

The officers on board Scharnhorst all stood upright at their posts and saluted the towering bridge of the Prinz Eugen.

"Hooray! Hooray the Prince Eugen! ”

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