The kingdom of Thebes, the once-capital of king Oedipus and one of the most heavily guarded cities in Greece. It was in this city where the story of the Seven Against Thebes took place. When seven legendary warriors gathered an army to try and conquer the city only to fail with only one surviving. Ten years later, the Epigoni, the sons of the seven warriors had grown into adulthood and planned to complete their father’s mission. 

Led by Commander Alcmaeon, this time the Epigoni knew that their army would have to be greater than their fathers and so gathered contingents from Messenia, Arcadia, Corinth, and Megara. The army was massive, enough to not just conquer the impenetrable city of Thebes but perhaps even the whole country with such mass of numbers and with such powerful leaders.

It was in fact, this dizzying amount of force and power that humbled Commander Alcmaeon. After an hour-long meeting with the leaders of each army, the commander-in-chief retreated to a secluded part of the forest to gather his thoughts and to be himself. Such a mass of force to conquer one city and to be its singular leader...

“Commander.”

Alcmaeon looked to the direction of the voice and saw that it was General Diomedes who had interrupted the commander, one of the seven of the Epigoni. And it’s youngest member.

“Argos’s troops are rested and ready at the helm, tomorrow morning we will advance into the open fields of Glisas. Is there anything else you wish?”

“That will be all for the night general. I thank you for keeping the men in line especially in such a turbulent hour.”

“Sir.” Diomedes swiftly turned and left back to his camp when Alcmaeon decided to ask the young warrior a question.

“General, before you retire for the night. May you humor your commander with a growing inquiry?” The young general turned around.

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“Aye sir.”

“Do you believe in faith? Do you believe in the idea that what we do has meaning? That our actions may in truth, be pre-ordained from the start and that we have no way of knowing? Did our fathers fail because they could not win on their own or were they destined to fall?”

Diomedes looked to the stars for a dozen heartbeats. Perhaps what his commander was speaking was the truth. Maybe their strength and their army was not from them, but what the Gods chose for them.

And yet…

“Permission to speak freely, sir?”

“Of course. You may be our youngest Diomedes, but your words are wise beyond years.”

“I don’t think it matters. Faith, destiny, the Gods. If I may be frank, they ought to leave us alone if they know what’s good for them. We seven of us are the sons of some of the greatest warriors and men in our history, my father challenged any man in Thebes’s throne for combat and won every duel and your father was able to predict his own death and betrayal. We are the sons of those men, and it is our duty to finish what they could not, Gods or any outside forces be damned. If we are destined to win then we are destined to win, but how we win is up to us. It’s up to our training, our skills, and our leadership to decide our victory. And if we are destined to lose, then we will be joining our fathers with tales of how many men we have slain before facing oblivion. For if divine faith does indeed control our destinies, it can decide how we live and how we died but it cannot deny that we did live.”

Alcmaeon tiredly smiled, the words of a true soldier.

“Thank you for your time general. Your words are a quiet comfort in these hectic times. Dismissed.”

“Sir.”

“May the goddess Athena smile on us for the morrow.” Diomedes strangely did not reply to that, bizarre.

Alcmaeon could breathe a sigh of relief though. Whether or not this battle was destined for victory or failure, he now knew it did not matter. What mattered was that they fight and that they would fight till the end of their breathe. Alcmaeon was not as strong as a seer as his father, but he knew that Diomedes was destined for greatness. The general  was so young and yet wiser than any adviser he had. Win or lose, Diomedes would survive, he would be the lasting legacy of this war and any enemy he would soon fight will know why

For Diomedes did not yield.