In the port of Königsberg, three devastated warships, accompanied by four submarines, slowly sailed into the harbor, and although the crews were exhausted and many of them were still bandaged, they were all lined up on the deck and on both sides of the ship, and the docks were crowded with people, all of whom were carrying flowers and small flags to welcome their triumphant residents.

Prince Heydrich, the commander of the Baltic fleet, also came to the dock to greet this heroic fleet, since the outbreak of the war, all the previous achievements of the German Navy were only Tirpitz's submarine sinking 2 British merchant ships in the North Sea, the light cruiser Königsberg in East Africa captured a British merchant ship in the Gulf of Aden, the light cruiser Emden in Qingdao captured a Russian mail ship near Tsushima, and the task force of Russ was the first time that the German Navy exchanged fire with an opposing warship after the start of the war. And with the achievement of sinking three warships, Kaiser Wilhelm II personally ordered the fleet commander Russ and the brave sailors to be commended.

Since the excellent admirals were eager to join the battle fleet, Chen Tian never found a suitable commander for the Baltic fleet, and finally he thought of his father, Prince Heydrich. The prince had served as a fleet commander in the navy, but he had withdrawn from the navy a few years ago due to ill health, and Tatsuten invited him to take charge of the overall situation, and the specific operational plan of the Baltic detachment was formulated by the fleet staff, and in Tatsuten's absence, Prince Heydrich decided whether to implement the battle plan formulated by the staff.

Dönitz's heart was a little sour, and when he and his submarine force silently followed the Russ fleet into the harbor, almost no one on the dock noticed the ugly ducklings.

However, the opportunity for the ugly duckling to turn into a whooper swan soon came!

Despite the victory in the first naval battle with the Russian Navy, Prince Heydrich clearly realized that the warships of the Baltic Detachment could not directly confront the main forces of the Russian fleet, and he abandoned this tentative offensive strategy, but sent submarine forces to block the Baltic Sea in turns, and some destroyers went to the coast of the Gulf of Finland at night to lay mines, and the naval air force began to patrol within the range of the voyage, "Super Duck Mother" and "Lisa" The aircraft carrier also sailed out of the port of Königsberg several times for tactical exercises, and the German naval forces were fully active in the Baltic Sea.

On August 27, Dönitz and his U-039 set sail in the morning light, and he and five other submarines were tasked with heading to the waters off the island of Chiuma to ambush Russian merchant ships and warships entering and leaving the Gulf of Finland.

At dusk, they arrived at their destination and began their dive. The exit from the Gulf of Finland is very wide, so the six submarines will fight independently at intervals of more than a dozen nautical miles, and they will maintain radio silence until they return home.

After the last battle, the activity of the Russians in the Gulf of Finland had decreased considerably, and occasionally one or two rare Russian planes would patrol the seas, and the U-039 in Dönitz did not wait for any prey until nightfall. Taking advantage of the cover of the night, U-039 slowly surfaced.

The sailors, who had been holding back in the cramped submarine for a long time, climbed onto the deck and chuckled quietly while breathing in the slightly salty sea breeze. A sky full of stars indicates that the next day will be a sunny day.

Wearing white gloves, Dönitz stood on the conning tower and watched with a bridge viewing binocular.

"Quiet!" Suddenly, he noticed a faint cloud of smoke floating in the west.

The sailors all fell silent, and everyone listened with their ears pricked up, and beyond the sound of the sea breeze and waves, there was a faint rumble of a steam engine turning.

"Slow forward!" Dönitz directed the submarine through the microphone to slowly start moving, and even on the starry sea, the pitch-black submarine was very difficult to detect at a distance of thousands of meters.

The rumbling sound became clearer and clearer, and a few points of light shone on the sea to the west, and when the points of light became clearer and clearer, Dönitz's face showed a look of joy, which were two small ships, which were coming from the direction of Stockholm and were heading towards the Gulf of Finland. Judging by the silhouette of the other side, one of them is a freighter of at least 6,000 tons, and the other is a warship with a low hull.

"1/3 of the speed forward! The bow torpedo is ready! ”

"Our ship's route is 10 degrees east of the north, with a speed of 6 knots, and the other party is located 11 nautical miles northwest of our ship, heading due east with a left and right heading at a speed of 14 knots." The rangefinder made a rough estimate of the time when the two sides met.

"Captain, we'll meet in about 40 minutes!"

With his chin in his hands on his mind, Dönitz decided to occupy the ambush position first, and then attack depending on the situation.

"Full speed ahead! Stop 2 nautical miles away from the opposing route! ”

Half an hour later, U-039 floated quietly on the surface, and in the darkness several pairs of piercing eyes were watching the prey of about 10,000 tons of gross tonnage—a 3,000-ton cruiser and a 7,000-ton freighter.

Dönitz frowned, the ship's massive hull was just blocking the cruiser to its left, and a torpedo fired from U-039's current position would have hit the freighter first, and he hoped to sink the cruiser from a tactical point of view. If the freighter had been sunk first, it would have been expected that the cruiser would have chosen to save people rather than flee.

"Slow forward! The whole crew got into the submarine and began to dive! ”

The red cabin lights in the submarine began to flicker, and all the officers and men prepared in a nervous and orderly manner.

"The submarine begins to dive!"

"3 meters deep!"

"5 meters deep!"

"Stop diving, raise the periscope!" Dönitz will pull down the periscope and begin to observe the situation on the sea, but the freighter is still tightly shielded from the cruiser.

"Torpedo No. 1 ready, torpedo No. 2 ready, determine the boat!"

"The ship has been confirmed! Nearest ship! The distance is 500 yards, and the launch angle is 87 degrees! The weapon commander quickly calculated.

"Okay, torpedo No. 1, launch!" Dönitz saw a white line appear in the periscope of the sea, and his steam torpedo dragged countless bubbles towards the other side, but he did not order the second torpedo in the bow to fire.

"Torpedo No. 2 is on standby, torpedo No. 1 is quickly reloaded!"

Dozens of seconds later, a loud bang was heard on the sea, and the officers and men inside the submarine high-fived each other, which was the first prey of U-039.

Dönitz did not join them in the celebration, but kept his eyes firmly on the periscope. The Russian freighter was on fire, the sailors on deck ran in a panic, and many jumped into the sea from the side of the ship that began to tilt.

Suddenly, the fire in Dönitz's eyes was half obscured by a dark shadow, and it turned out to be the cruiser that had turned back to rescue the sailors who had fallen overboard.

The captain of the Russian cruiser was scolding the impudent Germans for laying mines in the fairway, and another torpedo was silently approaching them.

Boom!

The torpedo hit the position of the ammunition depot in the front of the cruiser, which then caused a series of huge explosions, this time the nearby sea was covered in firelight, and the night became as bright as day.

A few minutes later, U-039 fired a second torpedo at the struggling Russian freighter, sending it to the bottom of the sea. All that remained was a pile of floating incendiary debris, and hundreds of Russian sailors were floating helplessly on some planks or boxes.

U-039 did not leave, and Dönitz believed that the Russian base should soon send rescue ships, so his submarine surfaced 3 nautical miles from the place of the battle, and everyone waited patiently.

At 9 a.m. on August 28, U-039 intercepted a clear-code telegram from the Russian naval base in Pokala, asking about the location of the light cruiser and the accompanying freighter that set sail from Stockholm on the 27th.

At 10 o'clock in the morning, the Russian Navy sent another telegram and asked the Russian warships in the nearby waters to search.

At 1 p.m., a 700-ton patrol gunboat of the Russian Navy appeared, and when it stopped to rescue Russian sailors, it was sent to the bottom of the sea by a torpedo fired by U-039, adding another group of Russians floating on the sea.

At 3 p.m., a Russian freighter passed through the scene and was also sunk by a torpedo from U-039 when it stopped for rescue, after which U-039 began to return and inform the Königsberg naval base of the results.

In the early morning of 29 August, when Dönitz and his blockade submarine returned to Königsberg, there was no such welcome as they had been expected, and the people on the docks were working silently with sadness on their faces.

"W-what's going on?" Seeing the flagpole of the naval base lowered at half-mast, Dönitz and his sailors were all stunned.

Just the day before, British submarines and destroyers, supported by battle cruisers, attacked the German naval base in Hurgoland Bay, and the German Navy was caught off guard, 3 light cruisers and 1 destroyer were shattered, and 3 others were severely damaged, and more than 1,000 sailors, including 1 admiral and 1 commodore general, were killed under fire. More than 200 people, including the son of Admirati Tirpitz, were taken prisoner by the British, and the British battleships suffered no losses, with about 75 casualties.

When the bad news came, the flag was lowered at half-mast throughout Germany in mourning.

Tears slowly slipped down Dönitz's young face, and the heart of every German naval soldier was crying......

When he heard the news, Chen Tian and his East Prussian regiment had already crossed the border and were marching in the direction of Warsaw, and after pondering for a long time, he sent a telegram to Prince Heydrich: "Operation Destiny" was carried out!

On August 31, pre-dawn darkness shrouded the harbor of Königsberg, and a fleet of ghostly warships quietly sailed out of the harbor. This fleet gathered almost all the capital ships of the Baltic Fleet, 12 standard-class destroyers, the aircraft carriers "Super Duck Mother" and "Lisa", 22 submarines and 4 transport ships entered the vast Baltic Sea in turn. The commander of the fleet, Prince Heydrich, stood on the flagship aircraft carrier "Lisa", looked at the neat rows of sea eagles on the deck, and could not help but feel proud that he would be the first person to direct an aircraft carrier to attack the opponent's military port. Although the more than 6,000 officers and men of the entire fleet did not know the purpose of this trip, they all vowed to avenge the death of the naval warriors in Hurgolan Bay.

Dönitz's U-039 sailed on the left side of the fleet, and he stared intently at the huge hulls of the two aircraft carriers in the fleet, and he was amazed at the speed of such a large body, except for submarines and transports, all the destroyers and aircraft carriers here had a speed of more than 22 knots, and the "Lisa" was designed to reach an astonishing speed of 26 knots.

After leaving the port of Königsberg, the flagship signaled: the fleet is moving at full speed, target the port of Kiel!