'......Boom'

The Izumi protective cruiser, which was rescuing the officers and men who had fallen into the water, was suddenly hit by a 305-mm naval gun unsuspectingly, and with the weak old-fashioned armor of the Izumi protective cruiser, even the main guns of a warship of the same level were difficult to defend against, and the 305-mm naval guns were like a grim reaper in front of it. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

A 305-millimeter naval gun crashed headlong into the front armor of the Izumi protective cruiser, drilling a hole about one meter wide in diameter about one-third of the entire warship, and then continued to drill inside, and then suddenly a huge vibration erupted, and before it could react, the Izumi protective cruiser erupted into a louder explosion.

The sound of explosions continued one after another, and the entire Izumi suddenly rose into the air, and the bow part of the ship was instantly blown up beyond recognition, and the entire warship was broken into two knots in mid-air, and then smashed heavily into the water.

The small boats that were rescuing the officers and soldiers who had fallen into the water did not even have time to react, and they were directly overturned by this huge wave, and even the officers and soldiers who went to the rescue also fell into the water, and the sea surface was as if dumplings were being laid, and everywhere there were splashes caused by objects falling into the water, some officers and soldiers who had lost consciousness, and some parts and components on the warship, and so on, and some unlucky Japanese officers and soldiers were directly hit by the wreckage of these scattered navy and warships, and then lost consciousness as soon as it was dark in front of their eyes.

The protective cruiser Izumi that returned to the surface of the sea did not have the good fortune it had before, and the first half of the completely destroyed part was lost in just half a minute, and only the small whirlpool left on the surface of the sea proved its existence.

And the remaining second half, the cross-section that was blown up was buried in the water, and the tail was raised high, and the whole warship was sinking little by little. The huge whirlpool created around made some Japanese officers and soldiers feel desperate, and those who were not injured swam desperately towards the periphery, while some of the wounded, although they were also desperately swimming out, but the huge current in the water forcibly pulled their bodies back to the center of the whirlpool, and then drilled down the whirlpool to the bottom of the sea.

At this time, the other warships around could only watch this happen, but there was no way to deal with it. At this time, perhaps except for those 10,000-ton battleships, other warships did not dare to approach at all, and if they didn't do well, they would even harm themselves.

And the distance between the Izumi and the battleship is a little far, and at the current sinking speed, even if the battleship rushes over, it is difficult to guarantee that it will be able to save everyone.

What is the Navy most afraid of? This is the current situation, the huge whirlpool generated by the warship when it sinks, the attraction of the whirlpool will sweep all the surrounding objects into the bottom of the sea, and all the naval officers and sailors know that once the warship has the possibility of sinking, then it is necessary to escape from the place where the whirlpool can reach as soon as possible, before the whirlpool produces the maximum suction.

And once you are carried to the bottom of the sea by the whirlpool, no matter who you are, no matter whether your water nature is good or bad, there is no hope of survival. And at this time, even if the battleship came, there was no way to save those who were sucked into the whirlpool, and even they themselves did not dare to get too close to the whirlpool, not even within a hundred meters.

The sinking of the Izumi cast a shadow on the Japanese Navy, although the Izumi was a third-class cruiser and an old warship that had been in service for nearly thirty years, but it was a warship after all, and it was sunk by a single shot? Although all of them knew very well that even a Japanese battleship could do this at the location of the explosion just now, they were still a little reluctant to believe this result.

On the battlefield, Togo Heihachiro didn't dare to delay too much time here, he knew very well that the fleet had to move on, and if he stayed here, he would only lose more warships, and now Togo Heihachiro no longer fantasized about anything, he only hoped to close the distance between the two sides as soon as possible, so that the Japanese side could regain some face as much as possible.

Two minutes later, the Izumi sank completely, and after five minutes, the sea level began to gradually calm down, and something began to float up from the bottom of the sea, but it was all dead.

The fleet quickly overtook the place where the Izumi sank, and finally left only the Uji second-class guns to rescue the surviving officers and soldiers who fell into the water.

The Uji has a standing displacement of only 680 tons, is equipped with two reciprocating steam engines, two ship-based coal-fired boilers, only 1,000 horsepower, and a speed of only 13 knots, and is equipped with four single-mounted Armstrong 76 mm 40 times caliber rapid-fire guns, with a full crew of 86 people.

A warship of this level is almost the same as being called a garrison boat, and neither the tonnage nor the performance can meet the needs of the current naval warfare, so it is purely normal to keep him.

After nearly half an hour of busy work, the Uji rescued less than 20 surviving officers and soldiers of the Izumi, while the full number of Izumi was 300.

The picture continued to follow the movement of the fleet, and after the Japanese Combined Fleet crossed the Izumi, it continued to maintain its formation and quickly advanced towards the Chinese naval formation in front. Although Togo Heihachiro was reluctant, he had to give up those stubborn ideas at this time, and he had to swear the existence of the Japanese Navy, and at the same time boost the morale of the officers and men of the Combined Fleet.

And even if the battleships Shikishima and Asahi were transferred, the Combined Fleet still has five battleships, including Mikasa, Yashima, Hatsuse, Fuji and Fuso, and there are currently only 11 battleships in Japan, and seven of them have been transferred to the Combined Fleet this time. You don't even have to guess to get the answer.

In addition to these five battleships, the Combined Fleet also has 15 armored cruisers, including Asama, Tokiwa, Yakumo, Azuma, Izumo, Iwate, Kasuga, and Nisshin, as well as some other light protective ships, plus 62 destroyers and torpedo boats, and the Combined Fleet, which is composed of more than 100 large and small warships, cannot be underestimated.

Although the line of sight was blocked, the Japanese Navy, relying on its rich combat experience, returned fire almost incessantly at the position of the Chinese Navy in the distance with the front main guns of the five battleships, but the hit rate was almost negligible, and not even a single shell fell within a nautical mile of the fleet.

And this cannot be blamed on the Japanese Navy's poor technology, but their equipment is inferior to that of the Chinese Navy, and without an advanced sighting system, they will always suffer on the battlefield.

But there is no doubt that the Japanese Navy's counterattack, although numerically inferior to the Chinese Navy (five battleships had only the front main guns, and the Chinese four ships had five main guns each), still caused some problems for the Chinese Navy, forcing the Chinese Navy to make some evasive actions.

And this also led to a linear increase in the accuracy of shooting, although in the next ten minutes, the shooting between the two sides was still back and forth, but most of them were false alarms, neither side was able to achieve any more results, and as the positions of both sides were constantly moving forward, more and more warships were put into the battle between the two sides.

From the initial fire-fighting between battleships, it gradually evolved into a fire-round between battleships and cruisers between the two sides, and some small ships continued to swim around with the advantages of small size and fast speed, and attacked the enemy mainly with torpedoes and other weapons.

Although the Chinese Empire has an absolute advantage in large ships, small ships are their weakness, torpedo boats, destroyers and other small warships, the Chinese Empire has not built much at all, and more is replaced by destroyers and frigates of about 2,000 tons, although the speed of these two ships is still very fast, even faster than the speed of Japanese torpedo boats.

However, after all, the number of warships is limited, and at the moment when the two sides entered a full-scale battle, the Japanese Combined Fleet actually occupied a slight advantage, and this advantage was mainly in the number of warships.

Battleships and cruisers can suppress the attack of the Japanese capital ships, but they are a little weak for those small ships, and the main guns of the small ships have no effect on these warships, but the torpedoes they carry cannot be ignored by any warship.

In terms of the number of warships, the Japanese Combined Fleet is twice that of the Chinese Navy, although this gap is mainly in torpedo boats and destroyers, but this gap really exists, and the Chinese Empire's speedboats are only two left, and the remaining seven are sent to intercept the Japanese troop carrier formation, which also leads to the passive situation of the Chinese Navy.

Today, the Chinese Navy is not only faced with the trouble of engaging the main Japanese fleet, but also has to be distracted from defending against torpedoes dropped by Japanese torpedo boats and destroyers, which carry a limited number of torpedoes, but the Japanese Combined Fleet has as many as 41 torpedoes.

The only thing to be thankful for is that all the warships of the Chinese Navy are new, and they do not suffer in terms of speed, and they are still able to suppress any warship of the Japanese Combined Fleet in terms of firepower.

'Da Da Da ......'

The anti-aircraft machine gun on a destroyer suddenly let out a roar, and a long chain of bullets carrying a large amount of fire smashed directly towards the sea, and bursts of water columns rose on the sea, but because it was a 12.7 mm anti-aircraft machine gun, the water column was not large.

'Boom! ’

About 300 meters away from the destroyer, a huge column of water suddenly erupted on the sea, and the entire destroyer felt a noticeable shaking, and the officers and men on the ship could not help but breathe a sigh of relief.

"Three o'clock, torpedo!" (To be continued.) )