World War: Battleship Arms Dealers

The HMS Lion shuddered violently, and all three main gun turrets opened fire simultaneously. The immense recoil caused the 26,000-ton behemoth to sway sideways several meters across the sea.

The shells flew into the thick fog, towards the German warships that were barely visible.

At the same time, other British battlecruisers also opened fire. HMS Princess Royal, HMS Queen Mary, HMS Tiger... the muzzle flashes of six warships merged into one in the thick fog, like the opening of the gates of hell.

The German fleet immediately returned fire. More shells rained down, and more water columns rose.

The sea was boiling.

"Hit!" the lookout suddenly shouted with ecstasy. "Enemy ship hit! I saw the explosion!"

Betty raised his binoculars. Through a gap in the thick fog, he did indeed see black smoke rising from the foredeck of a German warship. But the next moment, more shells rained down, and his vision was once again obscured by jets of water and smoke.

"Keep firing!" he yelled. "Don't stop!"

But just then, a deafening explosion came from behind the fleet.

Betty whirled around. Through the thick fog, he saw a scene that made his heart stop—

The "Indulgence," one of the older battlecruisers in his fleet, suddenly had a massive fireball erupt from its midsection. The flames were orange-red, mixed with thick black smoke, shooting hundreds of meters into the sky.

Then came a second explosion, louder and more violent.

The "Indulgence" broke in two. The front half was still surging forward, while the rear half had already begun to sink. Flames and thick smoke engulfed everything, swallowing the warship and its nearly one thousand sailors.

"My God..." Chatfield murmured.

Betty froze on the spot, the binoculars in her hand falling onto the deck with a dull thud.

He saw it. He saw the figures struggling in the flames, the sailors jumping into the sea, and the warship that had sailed alongside him for many years, reduced to wreckage in minutes.

"Lieutenant General!" The captain grabbed his shoulders and shook him violently. "We must retreat! Now!"

Betty snapped out of her daze. His eyes burned with a fire, but not the fire of battle; it was the fire of pain.

"Turn..." he said hoarsely, "Full fleet, make an emergency turn to 240 degrees. Release smoke and retreat at full speed."

"But Admiral Jericho ordered us to turn 270..."

"Execute the order!" Beatty roared. "240 degrees! We must retreat southwest, avoiding a direct confrontation with the main German force!"

The order was relayed. The British battlecruisers began an emergency turn, releasing smoke. White chemical smoke billowed from their sterns, quickly forming a curtain on the sea, obscuring the fleet's outline.

But the German artillery fire did not stop. Shells continued to fall, exploding into countless jets of water around the smoke.

Another warship was hit.

This time it was HMS Queen Mary. A shell hit her forward main gun turret. The turret's armor was penetrated, and the ammunition magazine exploded.

The explosion was larger than that of the "Indulgence".

The bow section of the warship was blown off, and the remaining hull continued forward for several hundred meters due to inertia before beginning to sink rapidly. Seawater rushed into the breach, forming a huge whirlpool that swallowed the warship and the sailors who hadn't yet jumped overboard.

Two ships now.

Less than fifteen minutes into the battle, Beatty had already lost two battlecruisers and nearly two thousand sailors.

They hadn't even gotten a full look at the German main fleet.

"Speed ​​up!" Betty's voice was so hoarse it was almost inaudible. "Full speed retreat! Move towards Admiral Jericho!"

The remaining four battlecruisers—HMS Lion, HMS Princess Royal, HMS Tiger, and HMS New Zealand—frantically fled southwest under the cover of smoke.

Behind them, the outlines of German warships were faintly visible in the thick fog, their gun muzzles still flashing like the eyes of a demon.

The roles of hunter and prey are reversed in an instant.

At 6:10 a.m., Jellicoe's main fleet...

The sound of cannon fire grew clearer and more frequent. Even from dozens of nautical miles away, even through the thick fog, the muffled thunderous roar was still awe-inspiring.

On the bridge of the Iron Duke, everyone wore a grave expression. They could tell that this was no small-scale skirmish; it was a main fleet-level artillery battle.

"Still no word from Betty?" Jericho asked, the third time in five minutes he had asked the same question.

"No, General," the communications officer replied. "The last communication was twenty-five minutes ago, when Lieutenant General Betty reported contact with the main enemy force and that they were exchanging fire. After that, the radio went silent."

Silence.

In naval terminology, this usually means two things: either the warship is damaged and its communication equipment is malfunctioning, or the battle is too intense for communication.

Neither of these is good news.

"Admiral!" the sonar suddenly reported, "A large-scale explosion has been detected! Bearing 065, distance approximately 25 nautical miles! Based on the sonar signature... it's a secondary explosion of the ammunition depot on a large warship!"

The bridge was deathly silent.

The ammunition depot explosion meant the destruction of the entire warship, and that almost no one on board would survive.

"One...or two?" Study's voice trembled.

"At least two separate explosions, about three minutes apart," the sonar operator replied. "Possibly...possibly two."

Two battlecruisers. Each ship carried nearly a thousand men.

Two thousand young people disappeared into the sea within minutes.

Jericho closed his eyes. His fingers gripped the railing tightly, his expression one of pain.

He seemed to see the faces of those young people—the sailors who saluted him from the ship's side as he departed from Scapa Flow; the officers who worked hard in training; and the teenagers who talked about the future in the tavern.

Now, they are all dead.

Because of a mistake, a reckless decision, and an excessive desire for honor.

"Maintain course, increase speed to 22 knots." He opened his eyes, his voice unusually calm. "We're going to pick up the survivors."

"But Admiral," an aide said worriedly, "if the main German fleet is just ahead, we might run straight into them..."

"Then let's crash into them," Jellicoe interrupted him. "The Royal Navy never abandons its brothers. We'll bring them home, life or death."

His gaze swept over everyone on the bridge: "Besides, it's too late to retreat now. The Germans know we're here, and they'll definitely pursue us. Rather than being chased and attacked, we should take the initiative and fight."

He walked to the chart table and tapped his finger heavily on the current position: "Order the entire fleet to form a battle column. Battleships in front, cruisers and destroyers on the flanks. We will use the most traditional formation to fight the most traditional naval battle."

"But in the dense fog, the column formation is not conducive to maneuverability..."

"But it's good for concentrating firepower and for command and control," Jellico said. "In such poor visibility, chaos is the biggest enemy. We must maintain formation, maintain discipline, and use order to combat chaos."

The order was relayed. The massive British main fleet began to adjust its formation. Twenty-four dreadnoughts formed a ten-nautical-mile-long column, like a giant steel dragon, slowly unfurling in the thick fog.

The main guns of each warship were pointed to the starboard side, the direction from which the cannon fire was coming from.

The boilers on every warship were running at full capacity, spewing thick black smoke from their chimneys.

On each warship, more than a thousand sailors took their positions, awaiting the impending battle.