On the night of May 3, the Imperial Navy seemed to have been cursed en masse, and everything went wrong, and even the retreat was changed.

When the Imperial cruiser "Tiger" received the retreat order from the "Empress Teresa" issued by Commander Lucien, it was trying to rescue the "Dreadnought", whose power had seriously decreased after striking a mine, but just one minute later, the "Tiger" was also hit by a magic torpedo launched by the Far East Submarines Squadron, and lost power on the spot.

On the "Dreadnought" and "Tiger," which were hit by "lightning strikes," a total of more than 3,000 officers and men were forced to abandon their motherships, move to nearby frigates, and hurriedly flee the scene.

The two Imperial cruisers, abandoned on the sea, became prisoners of the Far Eastern Navy and were towed to the dockyard in the bay of Parnia later that day for repairs. The Imperial flag, which hung on the masts of these two cruisers, was also taken off and replaced with the flag of the Far Eastern Navy.

On the former flagship "Charlemagne", which was abandoned by the commander of the Imperial Navy, Charles Lucien, only one senior officer refused to follow the headquarters to transfer, and then refused to carry out Lucien's order from the "Empress Teresa" asking him to abandon the ship and escape with all the officers and men.

General Xia Fei guarded the "Charlemagne", which had lost power, and personally waved the banner of "die with the ship", urging his officers and men to fight to the death until they were surrounded by the Parnia fleet, and still fired back without stopping.

Due to General Xiafei's repeated refusal to surrender, Prince Carroll's patience ran out and ordered his own warships to attack the "Charlemagne" with his own warships, which had already been impatient, to avenge the humiliation he had suffered for several days.

Twenty minutes later, the Charlemagne, which had suffered two lightning strikes and numerous shelling and bombardments, had finally collapsed in the waves and slowly sank into the bay. General Xia Fei and nearly 2,000 Imperial officers and soldiers on board were killed, and more than 300 people who had fallen into the water were salvaged by Parnia's lifeboats—many more would have been rescued had it not been for the interference of the Imperial Vulture Cavalry, who indiscriminately threw bombs at the drowning Imperial sailors and rescuers from the opposing camp.

……

At the same time that the Parnia's fleet besieged the lone "Charlemagne" and took revenge, Roland and his Far East Fleet had already left the warring seas, and all the warships that could still hold on to the battle regrouped with the flagship "Sea Palace" as the center, tracking the route of the retreat of the imperial fleet and advancing towards the Bologna Peninsula.

The chase lasted all night. During this period, the Imperial fleet was constantly left behind by battered ships, either lost in the depths of the dark sea or pursued and sunk by the Far Eastern Fleet.

After this battle, the main warships of the Imperial Navy lost nearly half, and the six cruisers at the time of departure are now only the "Lion", "Valorant" and "Fortitude", the "Dreadnought" and "Tiger" were captured by mines, and the "Indomitable" has been buried at the bottom of the sea; As for the three battleships that symbolized the glory of the Imperial Navy, the situation was not much better: the "Charlemagne" sank, the "Empress Teresa" was moderately damaged and could barely maintain its top speed, and the most dangerous was the "Crown Prince Frank", which was severely damaged by a magic torpedo in the power system, and its speed was reduced to less than eight knots, and the degree of tilting was also increasing, as if it could fall on the surface of the sea at any moment.

Worrying news continued to flow from the "Crown Prince Frank", and by dawn on May 4, the battleship's only remaining steam engine had also failed, and it could no longer produce steam, completely losing power.

General Lucien could not bear to abandon this expensive battleship, ordered the "Empress Teresa" to tow the "Crown Prince Frank", and thus began the slow and dangerous journey home.

For the whole night of May 3, and on the morning of May 4, cruisers, destroyers, and frigates of the Imperial Navy were able to hold out in battle, and they surrounded the two battleships, protecting them from attacks from the water or from the air.

After repelling numerous air raids by naval aviation units in the Far East, the Imperial Navy, which had fled in disarray, finally saw the vista of Coral Harbor on the horizon of the Gulf of Bologni after 10:10 a.m. on 4 May.

They thought that the journey to death had finally come to an end, but the nightmare had just begun.

When Charles Lucien, in the name of the commander of the Imperial Navy, requested to be stationed in Coral Harbor, which was temporarily leased to the Sea Blue government, so that the damaged warship could be repaired as soon as possible, the local naval commander unexpectedly refused.

Not only did the Blue Marines refuse to continue to borrow the Coral Harbor anchorage as originally agreed, but they also sent a fairly large fleet to guard the shipping lanes of Bologni Bay, assuming a ferocious posture of "watchdogs", ordering General Lucien and his ships to leave Bologni Bay quickly, otherwise it would be regarded as an invasion of the Blue Sea Sea and would be attacked by the local navy.

It was only at this point that General Lucien suddenly woke up to the fact that the Hailan authorities had changed their faces after learning of the disastrous defeat of the Imperial Navy at the Golden Horn, and tried to fall into the well and rub salt in his wounds.

"These bastards! Someday, you will pay the price for your betrayal today! ”

General Lucien was so angry that he cursed. However, anger is only a manifestation of incompetence, and the Sea Blue will not open the shipping lanes to block Coral Harbor because of his curses, and the Far East Fleet, which is getting closer and closer behind him, will not give up the pursuit because of his anger.

"Your Excellency, if we insist on towing the 'Crown Prince Frank', which has lost power, then the overall speed of the fleet will inevitably be slowed down, and it will be overtaken by the Far Easterners by this afternoon at the latest, and the consequences will be unimaginable." Vice Admiral Wernerve, the only one in the command who could barely maintain his composure, advised Lucien in a bitter tone: "In order to preserve the strength of the Imperial Navy, Your Excellency, we have no choice but to be forced to abandon the 'Crown Prince Frank'. ”

The reality was so cruel that General Lucien had to make the difficult decision once again to transfer the officers and men of the "Crown Prince Frank" to other ships, and then cut the hook and leave the battleship, which had become a burden on the way of escape, to fend for itself.

Lieutenant General Werneuf thinks a little longer. If the "Crown Prince Frank" was abandoned like this, the super battleship would likely become a prisoner of the Far Easterners, so he asked the officers and men on board to open the sea valve when retreating, and by the way, set fire to the ammunition depot, so as not to become a trophy of the enemy.

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