War is bloodshed, pain and rust. War is the thunder of feet and the lightning of swords striking swords and shields. Humans are often led to believe that they are more than just animals, more than their basic nature. Athens dares to rise above and continues to rise afterward, dares to journey into the unknowable while still fighting a war it has yet to win. Their eyes were on Geras when they should have remained on the battlefield, on the lives lost. Homer also portrays him in the Iliad with Achilles and his men, the anger overcoming him so much that he desires the death of his own soldiers to prove a point, and the price he must pay for his own glory is first and foremost the death of a loved one friend, and then his. War is too often a quest for glory, this is what Thucydides refers to when he says that "war is a stern teacher", that the lessons people learn from war are those that are never Achilles, the great and mighty hero. Achilles does not understand the ramifications of his actions, he is too caught up in his kleos and geras to internalize the damage being done. The meni that overwhelms him for most of the book blinds him to the cost that his supplication to his mother, and his mother's supplication to Zeus, exacts. He desires death and destruction on his side, just so he can have his war prize, his honor. Achilles remains absent for most of the book, and the only thing that brings him back to war is the death of his closest friend, Patroclus, who Achilles lets go into battle like him because it would bring him even more kleos. This amount of vanity, of stubbornness, is something that can only be eroded by the truth of war and violence. Until Achilles felt a major loss, he had no way of understanding the impact of his actions. He, along with everyone else, is not safe from the war of destruction