That many people were fighting to be the one who got sent to their death?
Did they really think wearing divine armor would make them the next Achilles?
Even heroes had moments where desire clouded their judgment and left them acting like fools.
What made someone powerful was never the armor or the weapon.
It was Achilles himself.
Every time in the myths Night read about how Achilles's friend wearing his armor scared the enemy into full retreat, he always wondered.
How long could a paper tiger like that last before someone with enough nerve stepped out and stood in its way?
And once the enemy discovered the deception, that the one inside the armor was actually a weak imposter, how was that person supposed to survive the rage of an enemy army?
The result was barely surprising.
In the original story, that friend of Achilles died terribly.
With no self-awareness of his own limits, he got swept up in the excitement and charged straight into the enemy alone.
You really think of yourself as Achilles.
But when he faced Hector, who set his own life aside and stepped forward for his country with no guarantee of victory, that kind of courage that came from accepting death completely,
Against a warrior who had forgotten life and death and therefore fought with several times his normal ferocity,
The ending was always going to be what everyone expected.
Possessing power that didn't match your actual strength was a genuinely dangerous thing.
At this moment nearly every hero rushed to support the idea and eagerly volunteered to disguise themselves as Achilles and go fight.
They seemed to have forgotten their own reputations as heroes entirely, ready to throw their lives away with a noble spirit, burning for Greece's cause, even if that meant disguising themselves as somebody else.
And everyone in the room knew perfectly well.
Night almost didn't have the heart to expose them.
Are you people willing to sacrifice your life for death?
That was just everyone eyeing Achilles's divine armor.
Based on what Night knew about these heroes, once the equipment was in hand, there was a zero percent chance it ever got returned.
This wasn't borrowing anything.
This was free loot.
The Greek heroes were a population of natural disaster-grade looters, every single one of them gifted with the essential qualities of a dedicated player.
Take everything, grab everything, strip everything bare.
Equipment I acquired through my own ability from other people(npc), why would I ever give it back?
Say one more word about it and I'll cut down the original owner too.
For a moment, the heroes started competing furiously among themselves.
They argued loudly and got increasingly unreasonable about it, every one of them insisting, with the energy of a market vendor fighting over produce, that they were uniquely suited to this critical task and that no one else could possibly be worthy of wearing that armor.
At one point Night even saw Thoas, one of the minor kings who was there mostly to fill out the headcount, spitting with excitement.
All that spiraling self-doubt from the night before was completely gone.
Greed and excitement filled every face.
All from one sentence he said.
The heroes of the Greek alliance nearly came to blows right there.
The air was thick with hostility, and each one glared at whoever they considered their strongest competition.
Odysseus was no exception.
Nobody was immune to divine equipment.
Even a wise man could be blinded by greed.
Just like in the original events to come, when heroes would fight over Achilles's legacy with his body barely cold.
When there was a legitimate claim to inherit legendary equipment, no one's heart stayed still.
Even Agamemnon felt the pull, and his expression turned ugly with a kind of petty, gleeful scheming.
Even if the armor would almost certainly not end up in his own hands, as supreme commander he was too important to be the one charging at the front.
But if this really caused Achilles to lose a set of divine equipment, Agamemnon would find that deeply satisfying.
A rival's loss always improved his mood.
In an instant, the spiteful king of Mycenae formed a dark little plan in his heart.
He was willing to gain nothing, even take a loss, just to see this scheme go through.
He just wanted to use this to show Achilles that even without him, he would not lose this war.
It's not that the coalition can't do without you, Achilles.
Agamemnon raised his voice:
"Then, all in favor of both proposals, raise your hands!"
When he called for order and held a vote, almost every hand went up.
Night was exempted from voting since he was the one who proposed it.
Even the experienced elder Nestor couldn't find a flaw in the plan.
The only real hole was that the suffering king of Sparta might not even be able to defeat Paris, a little vegetable chicken.
In the myths, the king of Sparta had such a physically imposing build that his appearance alone sent Paris flinching, and the latter nearly refused to fight at all until Hector grabbed him by the scruff and pushed him out.
But what no one expected was that this supposedly capable Spartan king turned out to be painfully average in actual execution.
He had a spearman fighting a bowman, spent forever in close combat and still couldn't finish Paris, threw his spear and switched to a sword, got even worse results, fought long enough to shatter his own weapon into pieces.
He finally caught Paris, and then Aphrodite swooped in and spirited him away.
So Night was not worried about Paris's safety at all.
This was a fair duel by every standard.
Even if Hector later found out Night suggested it, he would see nothing wrong with it.
Even if Paris died in the fight it would be his own fault.
He was the one who started all of this. If he died in a sacred duel witnessed by gods and kings alike, even Hector would not seek revenge.
Night actually disliked Paris quite a bit.
For a scum like him, dying in a duel might honestly be the most honorable ending available.
However, there were gods secretly protecting the other party, so Paris, the source of the war wouldn't be eliminated quite so easily.
Just like Agamemnon, who was equally well protected.
Back in the present, Agamemnon and the heroes were already arguing again about who got to wear Achilles's armor.
Nobody had stopped to ask whether Achilles was willing to lend it in the first place.
Odysseus argued it should go to the wisest hero.
A smart person knew how to maximize it's effectiveness without slipping up.
After all, the whole point was to impersonate Achilles and lift the army's morale while intimidating the enemy, not to charge into actual combat.
He stopped just short of pointing at his own nose and announcing:
'Yes, the wisest hero is me, Odysseus!
In the entire Greece who doesn't know that I'm the most intelligent of all the heroes. Other heroes use their fists.
I use my head.'
But his words were quickly refuted by other heroes.
Especially by Diomedes and others with real fighting strength.
They argued that if the fighter inside wasn't strong enough, it was impossible to carry Achilles's presence convincingly.
A demigod hero appearing on the battlefield without fighting at all was obviously impossible.
And the moment the fighting started, if the combat ability on display didn't match what a demigod should be capable of, the disguise would fall apart.
So the armor had to go to a stronger hero. Diomedes: That's right, with Achilles gone, the strongest person here is me!
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