January 12th, just before dawn, Puzhou Harbor.
According to instructions, the Heng River did not sound its steam whistle upon departure but instead sent a farewell signal with lights to the several barges seeing it off.
Outside the harbor, four destroyers from the Domestic Fleet had already taken their positions.
At the floating dock, workers were busy pulling up curtains several dozen meters high in order to conceal a large oil tanker replacing the Heng River before dawn arrived. Over the next few days, workers would piece together a flight deck on top of the tanker using black wooden boards and construct a superstructure. Once everything was ready, they would remove part of the curtains to show that a "carrier" was undergoing comprehensive repairs inside the dock.
All this was done to make the outside world, especially the spies lurking in Puzhou, believe that the maintenance of the Heng River would take a long time.
