It is I, the great Achilles. Once again I am not engaging in the fight. So I am here, watching from afar, with my fellow Myrmidons and Patroklus. From what we can see, our fellow comrades are overwhelming the Trojan forces. I could see Menelaus trying to offer a ransom for the Trojan Adrestus, however, the swine Agamemnon, convinced the Spartan king to just kill him instead. Since the battle was going in their favor, Nestor urged the men to not strip away the arms of the dead. I don't understand why, if it were me, I would have let my men take whatever treasure they could carry. From what I heard of the Trojan side, Hector fled from the battle to to see his brother Paris followed by his wife, Andromache. Apparently, both Hector and Helen gave Paris a good nagging, and because of that, Paris rejoined the battle. About time too. Soon Hector met with his wife, and she tried to convince him to stop fighting, but he couldn't escape his fate. Perhaps our fates shall collide in our future. But we shall see. As soon as the Princes of Troy rejoined the battle, the Gods interfered. Of course they would. From what my mother told me, it was both Athena and Apollo who decided to end the battle for the day. However to finish the day properly, they came up with the idea of a duel. It ended up being between Hector and the mighty Ajax. The duel raged on for quite some time. Ajax was able to make the brave prince bleed. Eventually, the heralds of Zeus ended the duel due to nightfall. The two heroes exchanged pacts of friendship along with gifts after the duel. When the duel was all over, my mother Thetis, said fare well, and went on her way back to Olympus. After the Battle was over, both sides ended the day in burning their dead. And along with that the Greeks ended up building fortifications around their camp, however, both Zeus and Poseidon had different plans for the fortifications. Late during the night, Zeus demanded that no other God can interfere in the war. At one point, Zeus traveled to Mount Ida to measure out the fate of the two forces. Turns out that my fellow Greeks' fate isn't so good compared to that of Troy. From this moment on, my fellow country men didn't look so good. They were retreating from the Trojans in another battle, and Hector pushed them back all the way to our fortifications. So I am told Hector wishes to burn the ships. He better not burn mine. Apparently desperate, Agamemnon prays to Zeus for relief, and he gets the sign he was looking for. That little encouragement got the men to fight back. Meanwhile, both Athena and Hera are desperate to help the Achaeans, but Zeus has the Goddess Iris send them a warning, and they do nothing. Zeus acknowledged that only I can prevent the destruction from my fellow Greeks. What does Zeus expect me to do, I'm not fighting for Agamemnon. Well....thats all for now.
When looking back at the first story I discussed, one major thing came to mind, and that was the situation with Hector. When his wife was begging him not to go back into the fight, he mentions that it is his fate. What I know from fate, and I willing to bet that Hector knows this as well, and that's fate is inescapable. No matter how hard we try to abandon it, it is always there. He feels the obligation to keep fighting and obtain his own glory. As I have noticed in the books of 7 and 8, the Trojans want nothing more than to defeat the Greeks, and to prove this, they camp outside of the Greek fortifications. With my fellow Greeks demoralized, it would seem like their doom is approaching fast, and like Zeus said, apparently I can save them from the pending destruction. When seeing both Hector and Ajax, exchanging gifts and friendship, it shows us the values that are placed on both respect and dignity. When the burning of the dead came up, it showed great respect for our fallen brethren. With the dead burned, their souls can be properly released, and they can finally enter the Underworld. There are only a few things in this world I respect doing, and one of those things is the burning of the dead.
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Ajax and Hector exchanging Gifts
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