The Tatsuda Maru sailed in the eastern Pacific Ocean, during the calm summer months on the west coast of the United States, and the 16,900-ton behemoth was remarkably smooth despite its speed of 17 knots. www.biquge.info In the cool summer of every morning, even third-class passengers on the mail ship will gather on the deck or on the guardrails on both sides, blowing the salty sea breeze to revel in the beautiful scenery of the sea and sky, at this time, the long journey across the Pacific Ocean seems to be an extremely pleasant tour, making people linger.

There is no war here! In the Far East, Japanese and Chinese armies fought fierce battles in North China and Shanghai. In the past, cruise ships were supposed to sail to Shanghai, but now, cruise ships are afraid that they will not be able to go to Shanghai - the Los Angeles Times and the New York Times have reported that Japan has just increased its troops in Shanghai a few days ago, and the war there will continue until the final victory is decided.

Naturally, the largest number of passengers on the Japanese ship is Japanese, and almost all Chinese, except for Manchuria, take the ships of the American Pacific Cruise Line or the British Royal Cruise Line. In addition to these people, there were also a number of North Koreans and whites on the cruise ship. Everyone was talking about the war in the Far East, and under the influence of pacifism, the whites almost condemned the war, but the Japanese were excited by the victories of the Imperial Army in North China and Shanghai, and the Tongzhou Massacre, which was heard from the domestic newspapers and talked about the tragic experience of the Tongzhou compatriots.

The Manchurians and Koreans, on the other hand, were extremely embarrassed, because the former were fighting with the Japanese army because they were their own compatriots, and the latter because they were not qualified to cheer or hate, so they could only talk about the weather in the Pacific Ocean in silence or weirdly.

The entire ship of Japanese was in a state of excitement and anger, and only the cruise crew, led by Captain Kimura Hei, remained calm. At this moment, the night shift had just ended, and Kimura Masayasu, who was holding black tea, was sitting on the wide bridge of the cruise ship, and the second officer, Takahito Sakuma, was observing the sea conditions with a telescope after routinely receiving the work of the previous shift. The sea is calm, and it only takes another 26 hours for the cruise ship to reach the port of Honolulu.

"What's that?" Sakuma didn't see anything, but a man next to him pointed to something on the side of the bridge: it was an airplane.

"Airplanes?" Sakuma turned around and looked at the plane with a telescope, and he suddenly had a feeling of great familiarity: it was a Japanese seaplane, but he wasn't sure. "Your Excellency......" He put down his binoculars and looked at the captain's wooden boat.

"A seaplane?" Captain Kimura also raised the telescope on his chest. "Where did it come from? What country? ”

The Kimura 7x50 Navy Zeiss telescope has a clear view of the plane, a single-seater seaplane with no country markings and no weapons. Although the other party was flying at a low altitude and the distance was not far, the sheepskin hat and scarf worn on the pilot's head made it difficult for Kimura to see whether he was a Caucasian or a yellow race. The sound of the plane's engine is getting closer and closer, and people on the deck of the cruise ship have spotted the plane. Perhaps the scenery above the ocean was too monotonous, and they cheered and waved at the plane, and some even hoped that the plane would land on the ocean and deliver a copy of the latest Honolulu newspaper.

Hundreds of people on the cruise ship cheered in the air, but Captain Xu Chengtong, who was piloting the plane, was shocked by the size of the Tatsuda Maru. The number of 16,900 tons alone doesn't make people feel anything, but when he really looks down on the whole cruise ship from the air, he realizes that the ship is too big. A question suddenly flashed through his mind: if the Japanese did not obey the order to stop the ship, how many 140mm shells would it take to sink such a large cruise ship?

The plane flew over the cruise ship, and according to the instructions of the captain of the ship, Colonel Gao Xianshen, Captain Xu Chengtong, who pretended to be a flying enthusiast, stretched out his hand and waved to the cruise ship. It's a tough job, but the shortcode was negotiated before takeoff, and he only needs to send a few simple codes.

The radio waves were sent from the channel 800 kilometers east of Honolulu to the Ninghai, which was 50 kilometers away, and the core officers, including the captain, deputy captain, chief navigator and others, had been waiting for news from the seaplane. The ringing of the telegram in the telecommunications room lifted everyone's spirits - they thought they had missed Tatsuda Maru.

"Here!" According to the code, Lieutenant Lin Renji, the navigator, quickly marked the location of the Tatsuda Maru on the chart, and sure enough, he missed it. The Ninghai, which had been avoiding the main channel, missed the Tatsuda Maru early this morning, and it seems that the side has underestimated the speed of the Tatsuda Maru. "Now the Tatsuda Maru is heading for Honolulu at a speed of seventeen knots. With her present course and our position, it would take about six hours to catch up with all our might at twenty-three knots. Lin Renji gave a rough answer.

"Turn right away, head 240, set. Sail at full speed. Colonel Gao Xianshen gave the order without hesitation.

"Heading 240, set! Sail at full speed! The helmsman repeated the command. The Ninghai began to turn 180 degrees.

"Six hours ......," Colonel Gao Xianshen sighed after giving the order. The chief engineer's guarantee, which had previously been guaranteed a maximum of four hours, is now more than two hours. And what's even worse is that because of the miss, the Ninghai is already behind the side of the Longtian Maru, and the capture is no longer a blockade, but a pursuit, which loses a chance to take a look. "What do you think?" The colonel looked at the men.

"What else can you think?!" The deputy captain, Colonel Chen Hongtai, had a grim face, and he didn't want to be disadvantageous for the first time. "It's the right thing to do." He took a few puffs of his cigarette before he spoke.

The deputy captain said this, but the gunnery commander who was sitting next to him, Major Gan Lijing, laughed at himself, and only after laughing did he say: "The maximum range of the three-year 140mm main gun is 19,000 kilometers, of course, there is no accuracy at all, more than 10,000 meters, there is no accuracy, but it is okay to scare the other party, I don't know the Japanese ......."

Gan Lijing said and looked at Captain Yao Fahua, the chief engineer. 19,000 kilometers is actually 19 kilometers, and if you chase nearly 30 kilometers in four hours, you can use artillery to threaten the opponent to stop the ship for the remaining 10 kilometers. But if the other side does not comply, then it must be close to within ten kilometers of the artillery bombardment to be really useful, and it depends on the ability of the engine! As long as the power can last for an extra hour, then there will be a drama in the capture, and to put it mildly, at least the Ninghai can sink the Longtian Pill.

Seeing that several commanders were staring at him, even in the cool morning, Captain Yao Fahua's forehead began to sweat, and he muttered in desperation: "Mazu bless!" ”

In the vast ocean, the Ninghai still maintains a speed of 16 knots after turning, and in the engine room on the ground floor, two ship-based Lv coal-fired boilers and two ship-based Lv oil-coal mixed boilers are slowly rising, these boilers will provide 15.5 kilograms of high-pressure steam for three four-cylinder three-expansion steam engines, and only when the three steam engines are working at full strength, the power system can output maximum horsepower, and the Ninghai can achieve a speed of 23 knots.

The furnace was blazing and steamy, and it took a full fifteen minutes for the Ninghai to reach its highest speed of twenty-three knots. This is a rare high speed after the Ninghai was launched and sea trials, although the sea surface is calm, but the turbulence brought by the speed of 23 knots makes everyone on the ship enthusiastic: the battle is about to begin.

The sudden appearance of the seaplane in the morning became the talk of the more than 600 passengers on the Tatsuda Maru all morning, and many were still talking about the seaplane until lunchtime. This proves that Honolulu is very close, and what you can buy ashore in Honolulu is another topic of interest to women and tourists.

The passengers were like this, and the captain Kimura was not alert to the seaplane in the morning. Although there was no national standard logo on the plane, and he knew that Honolulu was still 400 nautical miles away, there were no weapons on the plane, so it was likely that it was a pleasure to fly and a daring adventure across the ocean for the Americans - Americans always like to do crazy things, such as last month, an American female aviator disappeared somewhere in the South Pacific while crossing the Pacific Ocean, and the American society was so concerned about this that the Pacific Fleet sent many ships to search for it. This seemed to Captain Kimura to be completely superfluous, it was just a woman.

Today is Saturday, August 28th, and there will be a regular dance party in the evening. I don't know if it's for a rehearsal, the band is now playing in the first-class cafeteria. At this time, Kimura Ping Plate was filled with the best Haozhou steak, and the glass was French Bordeaux red wine, and he enjoyed everything at the moment. In fact, as a captain of a luxury cruise ship, if there are no storms on the ocean, it will be a very comfortable job.

The restaurant is full of music and the diners are all polite. However, the second mate, Sakuma Takahito, came in in a hurry, and as soon as he entered the door, he knocked down the white-clothed waiter with a plate, and the sound of 'clang......' broke the elegance of the restaurant, and everyone looked at this rude intruder with displeasure.

Kimura put down his knife and fork, took a shallow sip of red wine, and wiped his mouth with a white napkin before asking in a low voice, "What's the matter?" ”

"Your Excellency......" The second mate was still in a state of dazed and frightened, his voice was too loud, and as soon as he opened his mouth, he was greeted by the captain's angry gaze, he had to breathe a sigh of relief and whispered: "Your Excellency, we have found a cruiser of the China Navy!" ”

"Cruisers? The China Navy? It took Kimura a while to link the Shina Navy with the cruiser - no way, that rag fleet that only operated in the Yangtze River and offshore waters, no one could have imagined that it would appear in the eastern Pacific.

"Yes, it's on our left, and it's approaching at high speed!" The second officer said anxiously.

The cruiser of the Shina Navy appeared on his left and approached at high speed, and considering the Japanese and Chinese armies engaged in North China and Shanghai at this time, it was obvious that the other side had bad intentions. Kimurahei stood up, but in full view of everyone, he smiled and apologized to the people around him before exiting the restaurant.

"How far is it from us?!" As soon as he came out of the restaurant, Kimura's voice was actually louder than the second mate just now, and he began to get anxious!

"Probably ......" Sakuma Takahito was about to say that the lookout post could only see about eleven nautical miles of the sea, which was equivalent to saying that the cruiser was within eleven nautical miles of Tatsuda Maru when it was discovered; Counting the time he took to get from the bridge, the distance between the Tatsuda Maru and the cruiser in Shina was estimated to be only ten nautical miles.

Before the second mate could reply, Kimura heard a cannon sound, a dull cannon sound!

At this time, the Ninghai was already approaching within 19 kilometers of Longtian Maru, with the order of the captain Colonel Gao Xianshen, at 14:04, the first 140mm shell fired by the front main gun fell on the left side of Longtian Maru's course about two kilometers, and the shell exploded out of a water column of more than ten meters after falling into the water, and the smoke and dust of the explosion rose in the air together, like the Solomon devil who drilled out of the copper bottle.

The artillery roared, and this was a malicious greeting from the Chinese Navy. Every sailor on board the Ninghai laughed out loud - after nearly a month of hard work at sea, today finally caught a big fish, but for the crew and passengers on the Tatsuda Maru, the sound of the cannon was a terrifying signal, which meant that he was involved in a war at sea.

"Your Excellency!" As soon as he entered the bridge, the first mate jumped in front of Kimura's eyes, "The cruiser Shina sent a signal: ask us to stop the ship immediately, otherwise it will sink us!" ”

The bridge command room was already in chaos at this time, especially when they heard that the other side claimed to 'sink' themselves, which made the crew even more uneasy - the other side's shells exploded in front, and at this time, Rihua was fighting again, and if he violated the other party's orders, it was not impossible to sink him.

As a naval figure who had retired to the reserves, it was certainly impossible for Kimura to stop the ship honestly when he heard the threat, and in his memory, there were very few warships in the Shina Navy that exceeded the speed of 20 knots, and he had to see which ship he was facing first.

In a hurry, the telescope was raised again, and at a distance of 18,000 meters, a cruiser about 100 meters long with the blue sky and white sun flag was repeating the previous order with light signals and flags. As soon as this cruiser came into view, Kimura Hira's heart sank to the bottom - this is the Ninghai of the Shina Navy, built by the Japanese Harima Shipbuilding Institute on the design of the Yubari destroyer. It's really hateful, I can't imagine that this warship, which was launched in Japan six years ago, has become the great enemy now!

"Heading 340, the maximum speed of the two planes is advancing!" Kimura made his own decision. The Ninghai has a maximum speed of only 23 knots, while its own maximum speed is 21 knots. After changing course, the distance between the two sides is about ten nautical miles, which means that it will take five hours for the other side to catch up with them. Of course, in the course of the pursuit, the other side could open fire, but he judged that the cowardly Shina Navy did not dare to sink the Tatsuda Maru, because there were more than a hundred foreign passengers on board.

Kimura Hei's judgment was so, but subconsciously his idea was that he would never let the Shina Navy board the ship, because once the Shina Navy captured Tatsuda Maru, he would be a sinner in all of Japan, and he, including his entire family, would be treated differently.

The power of the Tatsuda Maru was four Mitsubishi Sur two-stroke diesel engines, with a maximum horsepower of 20,663 horsepower, and with the order of Captain Kimura, the Tatsuda Maru deviated from the course and slowly turned around and sailed to the northwest in order to widen the distance between the Tatsuda Maru and the Ninghai. Although the 16,000-ton ship was bulky, she quickly turned around with the skillful operation of the helmsman. At the same time, the four diesel engines were growing at full speed, and the ship's radio repeatedly called out for help: 'SOS! The ship was attacked by a warship of unknown nationality four or three nautical miles east of Honolulu......