"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
The violent bombardment echoed across the entire sea, heavy shells smashing into the water and throwing up towering columns of spray.
The heavy cruiser Tone was undoubtedly at the very heart of the storm, shells continually falling around her. Although the heavy cruiser Lingen's four twin-mounted 203mm Main Guns returned fire, their counterattack seemed so feeble and powerless beneath the German fleet's fierce bombardment. Though this naval battle had only just begun, its outcome was already set in stone.
"Boom!" A fireball erupted aboard the heavy cruiser Tone. A 210mm shell fired by one of the German fleet's heavy cruisers had struck her.
The shell hit the heavy cruiser Tone amidships, igniting a raging blaze.
The damage-control crews aboard the heavy cruiser Tone immediately tried to put out the fire. Sailors wearing gas masks dragged hoses toward the inferno.
But at that moment, the heavy cruiser Tone seemed as though misfortune had wrapped itself around her. Before the blaze could be extinguished, she suffered another crushing blow. A 380mm Shell fired from the Battlecruiser SMS Lützow smashed viciously into the heavy cruiser Tone.
"Boom!" Amid the deafening explosion, the entire heavy cruiser Tone seemed to tremble.
Her captain, Colonel Ōnishi Shinzō, went deathly pale. He knew that this time, the heavy cruiser Tone would likely be unable to escape disaster.
"Sir, the stern has been hit. The steering gear has been blown away. We can no longer turn!" a staff officer reported.
"Damn it! How could this happen?" Colonel Ōnishi Shinzō cursed viciously.
Having lost her ability to maneuver, the heavy cruiser Tone could no longer escape. Under the German fleet's fierce bombardment, she was hit repeatedly in less than ten minutes. Aside from numerous 210mm and 150mm shells, she was even struck by two 380mm shells.