When Natalia made this decision, she suddenly became happy and felt very brave and independent.

She got dressed, and in order to be brave, she also hung a small pistol around her waist. She left the medical camp and walked through the woods and on the main road. A happy wagon driver transporting cannonballs gave her a hitchhike.

At the front headquarters, she carefully inquired about the locations of several nearby troops. One of the operational staff officers happily explained the situation to her.

"We're attacking right here," he pointed with his big fingers on the map, "and this is Kyoto...... And this ......"

Although the lieutenant colonel carefully explained to her the situation that had taken shape at the front, she no longer listened. She secretly remembered the village where the front headquarters was located and was about to leave. But the communications officer kept her, and he told her that one of his wounded legs was in pain. Followed by other patients, Natalia was busy until noon.

She finally left the village. Here she got on a four-wheeled carriage for the exclusive use of the headquarters. Luckily, the carriage was headed for the headquarters. Natalia jumps down in the middle of a village street.

Natalia walked up to one of the guards standing guard at the door, "Excuse me," she said, "where are your scouts stationed?" ”

The guard asked, "Where are you from?" ”

She didn't know what to answer, but out of the room came a tall general in a Caucasian hat and a black beard, a major general. The Major General was slightly taken aback when he saw the young woman in a long waterproof shawl.

"Are you looking for me?" Major General Ponotkov looked curiously at the girl in front of him and asked.

She replied, "I'm looking for your scout troop. She boldly looked at him. Again. "I'm looking for Second Lieutenant Michelsky."

"Please come in." Hearing the name of Second Lieutenant Michelsky, Major General Ponotkov was silent for a while and said.

She followed him into the house. As they walked down a short corridor, a soldier sitting under the window saw them coming, jumped up and saluted. They walked into a large room, and there was no one there. On a desk lay stacks of documents and reports.

Major General Ponotkov stood.

"Are you looking for Second Lieutenant Mischelsky?" He asked, was silent again, and then gestured to his chair. Say, "You may be seated." ”

She was still standing.

"You may be seated." He repeated it harshly, rummaging through the stacks of papers on the desk, as if intending to find Ensign Mischelsky from there.

Under his strange and attentive gaze, she became uneasy. She thought an explanation was necessary.

"I met Second Lieutenant Michelsky in Paris," she said, taking a seat in the corner of her chair. "It's an old acquaintance, we've known each other for several years. We came to Japan together. A few days ago Second Lieutenant Mischelsky came to my medical camp, and this time, so to speak, it was my return visit. Don't worry. I'll go and find the Scout unit station myself. I beg your pardon for disturbing you. ”

Natalia thought it was strange. Why did the seemingly kind major general in front of him stubbornly not say a word. She explained the reason for her visit as she looked at his pile of papers. She finally looked up and met the general's gaze. Suddenly, she saw something that made her speechless. There was a strange melancholy look in the pair of smart eyes.

Major General Ponotkov found a report, looked at it for a while and said: "Second Lieutenant Michelsky...... Killed...... It seemed as if the troops were retreating, and he tried to stop them from retreating and fend off the pursuing enemy, but the result was ...... Someone shot him...... He was a valiant man...... The murderer has been executed, and it probably happened yesterday. ”

There was a knock on the door, but Major General Ponotkov did not get up, and after a while the knock stopped.

"I'm sad." She said.

She was still sitting, though she knew it was time to go, and she couldn't sit here anymore to disturb the Major General. But she didn't have the strength to stand up, and she didn't want to do anything, not even get up from her chair. The room was silent.

She finally stood up, said "goodbye," and went out.

In the street, a nervous chill seized her, her teeth rattling so hard that she could barely suppress the tremor until she walked past the officers running around the village. She wanted to find a place to sit alone for a while, but there were probably people in all the rooms.

At this point, her eyes fell on a strange shack with a courtyard attached to it, surrounded by barbed wire. It was dark and silent. She walked in and sat down on the hay spread on the ground.

She had been clenching her teeth, but they were now louder.

"Don't go crazy." She said to herself. She looked up and saw a few words written in charcoal and chalk on the wall: "We will never be able to escape from this sea of suffering." Farewell, my hometown! ”

The phrase "Dear mother......" begins like this, but the rest is sloppy. There are also many words written in various handwritings: "Long live the Tsar!" ”

The people who wrote these words, presumably like Ensign Michelsky and thousands of Russians, have already gone to another world.

She looked at the words "Long live the Tsar", this slogan deeply touched her heart, reminded her of all the painful past, and her tears finally flowed.

She walked out and walked slowly down the street, weeping sadly, and was no longer shy to see anyone, and no longer paid attention to the surprised faces of passers-by.

Natalia hated the war that had claimed the life of her sweetheart, but she had no idea that the death of the heroic Second Lieutenant Michelsky was not just caused by deserters.

Due to the negligence of the Russian engineering unit, Kondrachenko's carefully planned underground blasting operation was a complete failure, not only did not achieve the desired results, but instead caused more than 4,000 Russian troops attacking Osaka Castle to be killed, resulting in the collapse of the Russian army on all fronts, and the Satsuma army took advantage of the situation to launch a counterattack. Ensign Michelsky and several officers were aware of the danger. Attempts to organize resistance. But the Russian soldiers were already frightened at this time, and they only wanted to flee for their lives, and Mischelsky and the officers had to shoot to deter the fleeers, but not only did they fail to prevent the escape, but instead made the deserters think that Mischelsky and others were going to kill them, so they shot at these officers and killed all the officers.

Pity these heroic junior officers of the Russian army, who did not die on the battlefield. but died under the guns of his own people.

After learning that the Russian army had collapsed on all fronts, the commander of the Japanese government army, Oyama Iwa, was taken aback and immediately led the Japanese army into battle to block the Satsuma army, delaying the attack of the Satsuma army, which allowed the defeated Russian army to escape. The Russian army command was furious when they heard the news, organized a team to stop the defeated soldiers, and set up a Gatling machine gun to shoot at the defeated soldiers, and after killing nearly 1,000 people, the Russian army finally stopped running. Rendezvous with Japanese government forces and re-engaged in the fighting. Such. After several more days of fierce and brutal fighting, the battle lines of both sides returned to the situation before the underground demolition operation began.

Although the Satsuma army won another victory, Lin Yiqing calmly analyzed the situation and believed that there was a huge difference in the strength of the two sides. Once the battle is defeated, morale is depressed, and the enemy is greatly strengthened. With frustrated soldiers, they began to plan to defend the city again, and then held on to it in a difficult period." Therefore, he decided to shrink his forces and rely on the walls and terrain of Daguhan City to hold on, giving the soldiers and civilians here time to evacuate safely.

On May 12, 9080 (the sixth year of Daqian Guangxu, the thirteenth year of Meiji in Japan), after this painful defeat, the Russian army's offensive became more and more fierce, and the Russian army's absolute superiority in strength advanced in multiple ways. At that time, although the Satsuma army tried its best to hold on, due to the long-term high-intensity battle, the elite samurai were killed and wounded, and there were not many additional soldiers recruited from the local residents, and there was little training, and the combat effectiveness was low, so the strength of the army was sharply reduced, and it was less than 10,000 people, and because the troops had to be divided into various points, the troops were even weaker, and everywhere was scattered and garrisoned in small groups of more than 100 or hundreds of people, while the Russian army in front of it had more than 10,000 people.

The Russian army continued its offensive from May 17 to 25. On the 22nd, more than 100 Satsuma troops stationed on the Tenmu River east of Osaka Castle were killed. After that, 179 people of the Satsuma Army's Kamo Township, plus a total of 304 soldiers, were all killed under the leadership of the captain Akatsuka Gentaro, and soon, 1,280 people under the leadership of the Satsuma Army, including the captain Inudo Osanari and the military supervisor Takigawa Shunzo, and the Satsuma Army squadron leader Mizoo Kanbei, the squad leader Nagatomo Kannosuke, and the military supervisor Tsukiyoshi Yang were all killed, and the positions were all lost. The successive occurrence of such a phenomenon of "collective jade fragmentation" shows that the combat effectiveness of the Satsuma army has declined sharply, and more and more people have no hope for the future, and do not want to surrender to the brutal Russian army, so they can only choose to die on the battlefield.

At dawn on the 30th, the Russian army led by Lieutenant Colonel Pintov broke into Kyoto from the morning. The battle situation at that time was recorded in the "Southwest Biography": "The Russian army took advantage of the situation to attack the position of the Gancheng team from the sideways and approached the Zhenwu team from the front. The guns were fired continuously, and the momentum was very sharp. Zhenwu's sixteenth team retreated first, and all the teams retreated. The Russian army attacked, and it was about to reach the bottom of the hill, and the teams returned to fight for a long time, and the Russian army withdrew its troops at dusk. On the 31st, the Kanjo team was in Harada, and on the morning of June 1, the Russian army attacked in a big way, and our troops on the main road and the left flank were defeated and lost. The Kanjo team will also be besieged, while desperately breaking through, trying to reach the main road and then defend, but it is not good to retreat to Kobe Castle. And on May 29, before the Russian army arrived, Kirino Toshiaki ordered the military and civilians in Kyoto to withdraw and retreat to Osaka and Kobe, leaving a few small troops to block the advance of the Russian army.

After Kyoto was destroyed by fire, the entire Satsuma army fought on the periphery, and Kyoto was just an empty city. In order to prevent the Russian army from slaughtering the city, the Japanese government sent an imperial mission and issued a notice, demanding that the residents of Kyoto should not support the Satsuma army, and that after the arrival of the Russian army, they could hang the Japanese flag and the Russian flag to ensure their own work. Fearing that the Russian army would loot and prevent the people's morale from being unstable, Oyama Iwa instructed Army Major General Takashima Kannosuke to lead the 1st Special Brigade into Kyoto. The Takashima Brigade arrived in Kyoto on April 27, and on May 2, it entered the city with the newly appointed governor of Tokyo, Iwamura Tsutoshi, and then the 4th Brigade of Major General Soga Yujun also entered Kyoto. At this point, Kyoto was recovered by the Japanese government.

In order to prevent the Russian army and the government army from attacking, Lin Yiqing sent two teams, Zhenwu and March, to the direction of Kyoto to delay the Russian attack. The commander-in-chief of the Kyoto side was Beppu Shinsuke, and the strength of the Zhenwu team was more than 2,300 people from Captain Kenhiko Nakajima, 1,800 people from Captain Sagara Gozaemon and 300 people from the first section of the sword drawing team. A total of 4,500 people. The Japanese government army also sent the 3rd Brigade of Major General Saharu Osaharu to reinforce it. Saharu Osako is the Tokyo Police. The top officer of the Japanese police, his brigade is also dominated by police. The Great Forced Brigade, with the support of the 2nd Brigade, captured Daxiu on June 20.

※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※※

"How nice it would have been if I hadn't been the prince—" Kim Yucheng muttered.

After a while, Guo Chengsen came back, "Your Highness, it's verified." 11 transports, 1 large ship, 2 small ships, you can't go wrong! It's 'Balearic'. ”

"Notify the whole team, transfer to special combat readiness, and I'm so sorry if you don't take a bite of the meat on your mouth!"

……

While the signalman on the bridge of the "Jieyong" informed the three wingmen of "Brave", "Brave", and "Loyal and Brave" with light signals, the sailors in the engine room, shirtless and brazen muscles, pressurized the steam boilers under the orders of the chief engineer, and the speed of the four turbine engines gradually increased, and the speed of the warship increased to 39 knots. On deck. The officers and men who had already received the special combat readiness order through closed-circuit communications had long since taken their positions, and the guns and torpedo departments were equipped with double posts. The three triple 130-mm main turrets in the front two and one in the rear have been turned away from the central axis, and the gun bodies have also begun to adjust the pitch angle, and the two five-mounted 533-mm torpedo tube groups on the middle deck have also been uncovered MK3 solid rocket-boosted torpedo (8.2 meters long, 533 mm in diameter, speed in water 45-60 knots, range 10-20 km, warhead charge 200 kg, equipped with troops only in January 1943) The officers and men of the other three wingmen were doing similar things, and although the sea conditions were not good and the visibility was low, the Eighth Minecatcher Detachment had already practiced hundreds of times and had already become proficient in similar joint training.

"Your Highness, the target is 80 nautical miles away from our ship." Guo Chengsen reported.

"Then it's still far away, so that they all calm down, has the other party's course changed?"

"It has never changed, and submarines are not suitable for dispatches in this kind of ghost weather, so they did not take the 'zigzag' anti-submarine route, but took the shortest route to the destination."

"That's a good idea, but I bet they never dreamed we'd be waiting for them here in these weather conditions."

"Your Highness, the heavens are blessed with heaven, and the heavens will help me to accomplish this feat." Guo Chengsen didn't forget to pat Jin Yucheng's ass at this time, it was not a flattery, he just wanted to make His Royal Highness the Crown Prince happy, that's all.

"Know the destiny of heaven, do your best, the merit still depends on the brothers to fight for their own work, telegraph to Sa Yizhong, tell him to follow the flagship, attack the 'Balearics'; telegraph to Li Xinchuan and Deng Xiaoxian, after seeing the flagship and 'Fenyong' shoot, immediately attack the two destroyers, leave the transport ships alone, our speed is fast, and it is completely too late to pinch these soft persimmons after gnawing the hard bones." Repeat the command! ”

'Yes!' 'Brave' follows our ship to attack the 'Balearics', 'Brave' and 'Loyalty' attack the enemy destroyer, and when they succeed, they will destroy the transport! Guo Chengsen loudly repeated the written message and presented it to Jin Yucheng. After His Royal Highness the Crown Prince waved his pen and signed his words in the lower right corner, Adjutant Guo saluted and then exited the bridge.

……

At this time, the Spanish convoy was moving at a speed of 13 knots at a distance of 80 nautical miles, and the destroyer "Churuka" under the command of Lieutenant Commander Prado was the outpost of the fleet, Captain Santos, the commander and captain of the fleet, was in charge of the heavy cruiser "Balearics" to provide direct cover for the transport, and the destroyer "Admiral Fernández" under the command of Lieutenant Commander Aznar was in the rear position. Based on the design of the "London" class heavy cruiser, the "Balearic" freeboard is tall and floating, and has better wave resistance; However, the "Churuka" class, which is based on the design of the destroyers of the H-class fleet, is not so stable, and both destroyers have experienced a relatively serious short-term rollover, and the crews are miserable. The mast of the "Balearic" is equipped with the "Richstein-2" sea search radar developed by the Germans, but the Germans, who like precision and ingenuity, obviously did not consider the possibility of the radar being used in such bad sea conditions, so although this radar is turned on, there is a clutter on the screen, and it is impossible to distinguish which one is just the spray of the waves and which one is a valuable target, which also plays a role in psychological comfort.

When the distance between the two sides was shortened to 40 nautical miles, the Eighth Mine-Catcher Detachment, which had been in a long snake formation, began to change formations, and the No. 3 and No. 4 ships, the "Gangyong" and "Zhongyong," left the queue to form a new attack formation. (To be continued......)