Chapter 388: King vs. King

Hunt was a veteran pilot with rich combat experience. He had once, in Belgium, shot down a brand-new German Fw-190D fighter while flying an older model. He had then, because of this battle, been transferred back to the home country to become a pilot in the ace fighter unit flying the modified Me-109C. Later, this unit, due to the difficult war situation, had also been transferred to France, and Hunt had thus achieved his second and third combat victories.

He had shot down two Fw-190D fighters and had also shot down a Stuka dive bomber. In the Royal Air Force, which was already short of pilots, this was a rare and valuable exception. Therefore, Hunt had once again been promoted and had been transferred back to the home country for a second time to become a major and a flight instructor in the Royal Air Force.

Subsequently, Germany had begun to bomb Britain, and Hunt had sortied again. In a few days of air combat, he had achieved the excellent combat record of shooting down two Do-217 bombers, becoming one of the few fighter ace pilots in the Royal Air Force in one fell swoop. Subsequently, his mount had also been changed from the Me-109C to the domestically produced British fighter, the Hurricane.

As one of the few ace pilots in the British home air defense, his Hurricane had even undergone some modifications, replacing the 7.7mm machine guns, which were useless against bombers, with the formidable 20mm cannon. But this had also caused a decrease in his Hurricane’s maneuverability, making it not as agile as other Hurricanes.

This time, he had led his wingman to challenge the enemy, which was also a helpless move on the part of the British due to the lack of fighter pilots. But Hunt did not mind. He felt that the German air force pilots could only be ferocious for a time by relying on their advanced aircraft, and that the Royal Air Force, which had been re-equipped with the Hurricane, had already filled the gap between themselves and their opponents. The two sides could completely fight a fair battle.

But he did not know that the original British home aircraft production lines had been seven or eight-tenths destroyed by the German bombing. The production of the Hurricane could no longer keep up with the losses. Now, Britain, by scraping together what it could, could only be said to have barely 70 Hurricanes. But the attack groups that Germany committed each time had as many as a hundred combat aircraft.

In France, the German Air Force had 1,500 fighters, and the number of Do-217 and Butcher bombers exceeded 700. And Britain, even counting planes like the P-36 and the Defiant and Swordfish, had only 1,500 planes in total. And the number of bombers, because several attacks on the German mainland had been a journey of no return, was already negligible.

There was an irreparable gap between the two sides in both quantity and quality, which a pilot of Hunt’s level naturally did not know. What he knew was that this time, the Royal Air Force had sortied in full force, and in the distance, a full 100 fighters were waiting for his performance.

As long as he could “kill the general and capture the banner,” shooting down a German fighter, the British fighters behind him would be emboldened and would swarm up to deal a heavy blow to the German formation that was bombing London this time. At the cost of losing some of their own planes, they had to teach the German pilots a profound lesson.

But all of this was, after all, just a beautiful wish. Now Hunt was being pursued by a German fighter, and he was at his wit’s end. He was constantly changing his flight path, using maneuvers to change his flight speed, hoping to shake off the entanglement of the German fighter behind him. But no matter how he changed his flight path, the distance to the enemy plane behind him was not pulled away, or rather, it was getting closer and closer.

“Wingman! Wingman! Cover me! Cover me!” At this very moment, Hunt could not care about any so-called master style. He called for his wingman to give him cover, but the reply he got was a pitiful silence. He did not yet know that just a dozen or so seconds ago, his wingman had accidentally flown into Heinz’s firing range and had been riddled with holes by a burst of fire.

Hunt, who felt that his palms were all sweaty, had the urge to curse his mother. He braced himself and continued to wiggle his control stick, making the Hurricane enter a spiraling descent. He then adjusted his frequency and called for his distant comrades. “This is Hunt! This is Hunt! Don’t wait any longer! Come and help! My wingman has been shot down. I need help!”

It was not just the British ace pilot, Hunt, who was in a state of confusion at this very moment. The German ace pilot who was pursuing him from behind, Heinz Bär, was also sweating from his palms and was extremely nervous. Such a fierce aerial pursuit could not be completed by a single ace pilot. Just as a chess master and a stinky chess basket could not play a famous game, only two ace pilots could stage such a fierce aerial dogfight.

The other side had tried to turn the tables more than once. If it weren’t for his caution, he would have been shot down at least twice by now. It wasn’t until just a moment ago, when the other’s wingman, perhaps because he was too nervous, had run into Heinz Bär’s muzzle after a big pull-up and had been blown to pieces by a 30mm cannon shell, that the German plane, which now had the upper hand, had still been unable to achieve a kill.

Now that British Hurricane was attempting a spiraling descent, which was not an advantageous flight attitude for a German fighter. Heinz had already shot down one plane, and his altitude was already close to 4,000 meters. Heinz Bär, being cautious, felt that it was time to return to his fighter formation to avoid being ambushed by the British.

But he keenly noticed that the British Hurricane did not seem to continue its descent but had switched to level flight at an altitude of about 3,500 meters. So he made up his mind and decided to risk a try.

As soon as he thought of it, he did it. He pushed the plane’s control stick, making the plane enter a dive again, and at the same time, he reminded his own wingman on the radio, “You continue to climb. I will dive and attack one last time. Whether I succeed or not, I will immediately pull up and return to an altitude of 8,000 meters. You pay attention to the alert around you!”

His wingman heard his call and immediately replied, “Alright! I’m climbing. Please be careful!”

Heinz Bär, having received the confirmation, had already begun his diving attack. The fighter’s engine roared loudly and once again entered a state of extreme speed. This FW-190D also flew to a high speed of nearly 660 kilometers.

It was clear that Hunt had not expected Heinz Bär to dare to dive and attack at this altitude. Because ever since they had ambushed a batch of German fighters last time, it seemed that the Germans had rarely flown below the 4,000-meter limit. He looked up and glanced at a German fighter that was climbing, which further confirmed his thoughts.

I’ve finally escaped this calamity, Hunt thought. He let out a long sigh of relief and took off his oxygen mask, wiping the sweat that was dripping from his forehead with his hand. He wiggled the plane’s control stick twice and had his mount fly in the direction of the main force. He looked up and already saw the group of British fighters in the distance. He was finally safe.

“Hunt! Hunt! There’s a German fighter behind you! Break! Break…” a voice from his teammate shouted urgently in his headset. Hearing this reminder, he suddenly realized something and subconsciously pushed the plane’s control stick to one side.

When he looked down at his hand and the plane’s control stick, he found that a bullet had just passed through his chest and had hit the instrument panel in front of him, kicking up a shower of sparks. The sound of the cockpit glass shattering came, and a cold wind rushed in like a wild beast. A piercing pain was transmitted from his body to his brain, and following that, a blood-red liquid filled Hunt’s vision.

Subconsciously, he wiped his face with his hand. The sticky liquid was either sweat or blood. Strength drained from his body. His left hand, which had always been on the control stick, finally hung down limply. As the world spun, he closed his eyes and could no longer feel anything.

Heinz Bär had finally hit the opponent who had been tangling with him for more than ten minutes. Watching that plane fall with a trail of smoke, he quickly began to make evasive maneuvers, circling and pulling up, and at the same time, began to search for the position of his own wingman.

“Lead! Lead! Climb quickly. Not far to the west, a large number of British fighters are approaching! Watch your six! Watch your six!” the wingman’s loud reminder came through the headset to Heinz Bär.

As he pulled up, Bär, who had just shot down two enemy planes, looked up and searched the nearby sky. He also happened to see the approaching British fighters. “Accelerate, wingman! We’re returning to base! We’re returning to base!”

The British at this time were mostly still using the arrow-shaped flight formation. This formation was to have the planes fly in a large V-shape, like a flock of geese flying south. Although this formation had the prototype of a main and wingman for mutual cover in air combat, it was not as flexible and versatile as the German’s two-plane fighter teams. Although the British had also tried to improve, the progress of the war was really too fast, and these details had not yet been changed.

When the densely packed British planes flew over, the two German fighters were already at a high altitude of 8,000 meters, which was almost unreachable for them. And with their high altitude and high speed, it was also very difficult to pursue. These British fighters, seeing their ace shot down, also lost the heart to get entangled, so they just flew a couple of circles, changed direction, and left this airspace.

On an open space on the outskirts of London, a fighter plane had crashed to the ground. The explosion rolled up thick smoke that scattered into the sky, as if the soul of this fighter was unwilling to fall and wanted to return to that grey sky. A few sallow-faced Englishmen were gathered not far from this fighter, looking down at the body of the pilot who had been thrown from the cockpit at the last moment.

The police arrived and carefully confirmed the things on the pilot’s body. Five large-caliber 13mm bullets had pierced this British pilot’s parachute and chest. The blood had stained his entire uniform. The huge impact had twisted his legs and arms into strange angles, just like the current Royal Air Force—a gruesome sight.

A policeman silently stepped forward, took out the pilot’s identity tag from his collar, and forcefully tore it off. He looked at the blood-stained writing on it: “Hunt.”

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