There were three conditions necessary for the Greeks to bring about the fall of Troy.
The first was to find Achilles' son, who was hiding in seclusion on the island of Scyros.
The second was to bring back the great hero Philoctetes.
The third was to find the sacred statue of Athena that Troy had carefully preserved within the city and steal it away.
According to the myths of ancient Greece, whenever a great war was about to begin, the kings and rulers of the various factions would seek out prophets and seers, hoping to learn the outcome of the coming conflict.
Would they win?
Would their enemies triumph?
The answer could determine everything.
A ruler whose prophet could accurately foresee the future naturally possessed a tremendous advantage over his opponents.
And the more accurate and reliable a prophet's predictions proved to be, the more likely that side was to gain the upper hand in the end.
In this regard, Troy could be said to have been blessed by fate.
Not only did the city possess
Princess Cassandra, whose prophetic abilities were so powerful that she nearly managed to expose the Trojan Horse before it could bring about the city's destruction, but the Trojans also had another prophet who was captured by the Greeks during the ten-year war.
The Greeks forced information out of him and learned about the three conditions necessary for Troy's defeat.
Afterward, Odysseus used his famously silver tongue to find ways of fulfilling all three seemingly impossible conditions.
And, just as the prophecy foretold, Greece ultimately emerged victorious.
However, this Trojan War was no longer the same as the one recorded in the original myths.
Far too many things had already changed.
Most importantly, Odysseus, the 'true protagonist' whose later adventures would eventually become the story known as the Odyssey, had already been imprisoned.
Under these circumstances, fulfilling those three conditions would be far more difficult than it had been in the original history.
And while Cassandra was making her prophecy in Troy...
The Greeks were receiving a prophecy of their own.
The captured Trojan prophet had revealed the three necessary conditions for victory.
The first condition had originally referred to the period after Achilles' death, when the Greek forces would suddenly find themselves lacking a warrior capable of replacing their greatest hero.
By that time, Achilles' son, Pyrrhus, had grown up.
He was perfectly suited to fill the gap his father had left behind.
The young warrior would later take the name Neoptolemus, a name meaning 'young warrior'.
Although he could never match his father Achilles in strength, Neoptolemus was still an extremely formidable warrior, and on the battlefield, he proved himself time and again, killing numerous Trojan heroes.
After Troy fell, however, the things he did became infamous for their brutality.
Such as grabbing Hector's young son and throwing the child from the city walls, killing him before the eyes of Hector's wife.
He also beheaded the old King Priam.
And then there was the beautiful Trojan princess Polyxena.
Neoptolemus killed her as well, sacrificing her to his already-dead father Achilles as a concubine in the afterlife.
However, regarding this powerful and brutal warrior, the heroes did the math and realized that the person's current age was still that of a little kid.
Clearly, this prophecy had arrived far too early for Greece.
As for the great hero Philoctetes, he had secretly slipped away right after gifting the divine bow to Griffith, and who knows where on earth he had fled.
It was completely impossible to go demanding him back from the mighty Heracles, wasn't it?
If they had known that Philoctetes's divine bow was the true key to killing Paris, where the bow was what truly mattered rather than the man, they would have certainly done whatever it took.
Well, even if they had known, they would have had no way to deal with Griffith anyway.
Thus.
Among the three prophecies, the only one that appeared reliable and actionable right now seemed to be the final one: heading into Troy to steal the sacred statue of the Goddess Athena.
The statue of Athena had been bestowed upon Troy by Athena herself at the city's founding, imbued with authentic divine power, serving as a special structure capable of protecting Troy.
Back then, Athena and Troy were still in their honeymoon phase, which was why she left this power behind as a testament.
Athena would not casually take this statue back on her own; it required mortal heroes to operate and achieve it themselves.
However, Diomedes and Odysseus, the two figures responsible for this task in myth...were not available.
One had run off while the other was locked away as a criminal.
For a moment, the Greek camp truly could not pick out a single suitable candidate.
To say nothing of the fact that Athena currently showed clear signs of actually defecting to the Trojan camp; otherwise, why would even her devout believer Diomedes be missing?
At this moment, inside the command tent headed by the War God, upon hearing these three prerequisites for victory.
Finding it utterly tedious, Ares spoke up bluntly: "Even without relying on fate, solely with my own might, I shall achieve victory myself!"
Ares dismissed it with complete disdain, showing zero intention of following the original prophecy.
Had Night known his thoughts, he would have certainly given him a thumbs-up.
As expected of the War God who walks straight into every pitfall wherever he goes.
Failing to end up as his teammate was perhaps a stroke of pure luck.
Yet right at that moment, a wave of divine power descended, and the voice of Eris echoed inside the mind of the War God Ares.
"No, Ares... pay no heed to the first two prophecies. However, you can dispatch men to steal Athena's statue."
"Eris...? Why are you here?"
Ares frowned.
Eris thought to herself with pure malice: Naturally, I came to see if there is still a way to use a tool like you.
Having just suffered a savage blow at Griffith's hands, Eris was injured once again.
And this injury was entirely incomparable to the minor backlash she suffered previously when the Arrow of Artemis acted on its own to defend its master.
Indeed, the fake Athena who had been cleanly pierced by Night using the divine bow of Heracles alongside the Arrow of Artemis was none other than her.
Because she had been pierced right through.
This injury was so severe that it even left her power incapable of suppressing the divine might of the statue inside the city of Troy.
Failing to suppress Athena herself was one thing, but failing to even overcome a single statue of hers left Eris feeling profoundly humiliated.
It also made her crave becoming a true member of the Twelve Olympians even more, to seize the authority and power of the War God.
This humiliating setback forced her to seek out Ares once again, relying on his aid.
Yet unexpectedly, the moment she arrived, she overheard such an intriguing development.
Stealing the divine statue?
This happened to perfectly solve her dilemma, and would even plunge this battlefield into deeper chaos.
Furthermore.
Eris's power to peer into the hearts of men came into play once more.
She turned her gaze toward King Agamemnon of Mycenae among the many heroes in the tent, and the corners of her lips curled into a dangerous, manic arc.
Eris laughed, as she seemed to have discovered something rather amusing.
That Griffith was actually...
An undercover spy?!
'Ah, my dear hero, Griffith.
I love you so dearly, yet you cruelly hurt me time and time again, shutting out this goddess who merely wished to draw closer to you repeatedly.'
'Then you cannot blame me for being unmerciful.'
'This was the single hero capable of making this goddess Eris suffer defeat, and repeatedly at that.
Whether it was the son of Poseidon, the warrior of Athena, or even Apollo himself, none could see through her disguise, yet you alone.
Griffith, you always catch me so thoroughly off guard.'
This sensation of pain was an unprecedented, novel experience she had never felt before.
'It hurts so much!
Yet it makes me want to possess and destroy you all the more, Griffith.'
Since disguises cannot fool you. (Two failed disguises had gradually made Eris realize that the craft she excelled at most was seemingly useless against that hero.)
Then.
You can see through my disguise, but can other mortals do the same?'
'When you find yourself in agonizing pain due to slander, rumors, and even the betrayal of your own companions, at that time only I can save you.
Will you be obedient this time, my dear Griffith?'
Seemingly imagining that very scene, Eris was already beginning to look forward to it.
.
.
.
(End of the Chapter)