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Listen, I read your post about Percy's strategic genius and I thought something.
Percy, Sally, and the entire Jackson family are descendants of Odysseus.
Sally is also damn smart, just look at how she competently got rid of Gabe and remained in full advantage.
And that is why how Athena treats Percy in this way.
He is a descendant of her beloved mortal, so similar to him in his mind and the son of her sworn rival, who tormented this very mortal and prevented him from returning home.
You seriously have no idea how GENIUS that headcanon is like holy hell the sheer depth it adds to everything is insane.
1. Athena begrudgingly guiding Percy in Titan's Curse, getting extreme deja vu (God's probably get that a lot) from the situation and how conflicting she gets over the mortal that is Perseus Jackson for his uncanny resemblance to Odysseus when it comes to his wit and his personality minus strangely the hubris.
Despite her disdain for him out of some strange loyalty, she tells him of his fatal flaw and how it would endanger him.
She let's her loathing for Poseidon get the best of her in Titan's Curse and votes to kill Percy and Thalia but Percy like Odysseus has both the wit and achievements she can't overlook despite her desperate intentions to and hence in the Last Olympian she acknowledges in her own subtle way that Percy is the greatest demigod of this age. That he's saved both the world and his friends.
2. Annabeth proud and confident as ever would be flabbergasted that Percy who she despite her supposed love for him undermines him almost always when it comes to his intelligence finds out that her mother has acknowledged Percy for his strategic mind and that he is the descendant of her mother's most favored mortal ever. (Maybe just maybe it will tone her hubris down a notch and then some, and if we are really lucky, a reality check)
3. Percy would laugh, probably shrug at the revelation. After all, stuff like that makes no difference to him.
4. But I can imagine if Sally knew beforehand about it, then how much hell must she have given Poseidon over it and probably still finds it to be a hilarious coincidence .
5. To Poseidon himself, it must have struck as an agonizing coincidence, but for the better, because for all of Poseidon's flaws, he loves his own intensely. His godly children, his monstrous children, his demigod children, and Percy, he loves most out of them all by his own words and he loves him so in some strange manner for the same humanity he scorned Odysseus for having.
Sally must have made him see the error of his ways, and even Poseidon for his quick temper would be loathe to not change his opinions on mercy then. (If the Queen among mortals tells you, you listen)
All in all, everything that happened in the Odyssey with Poseidon Odysseus and Athena would have come to a good closure with this.
That a millenia later by strange set of circumstances Athena and Poseidon begrudgingly acknowledged the folly in their perspectives from the times of Odyssey all because Poseidon met Sally Jackson and sired a demigod child who by a twist only the fates could make up turned out to be the descendant of Odysseus himself. (I reckon the fates must be cackling in glee at the whole thing)
PS: Hermes is having a blast with this news of Percy's ancestry.
No, but seriously, you have given me more pjo brainrot. (Now I hope this keeps you awake like it does me)
And on that note, Percy would totally canonly be the biggest fan of Epic the Musical, lol.
I have a feeling I am not going to stop talking about this now.
If I see one more person draw a wrong parallel and go " Percy gave up immortality for Annabeth just like she gave up the chance to be a huntress....."
Those two things are so vastly greatly different that they can't be compared. They are derived from one another but they are nowhere near on the same level. Minorly enhanced physical prowess and the ability to be ageless has absolutely nothing on Godhood, unquestionably great power and the gift of immortality .
I don't understand why no one draws the parallel between Sally and Percy:
Sally Jacskon turned down the chance to be a queen, to be immortal [Poseidon would obviously grant her some semblance of immortality in order to live among Atlantis and to be unharmed] , a chance to have the literal personification of the Seas go against it's very nature of perpetuality to stop the tide for a mortal such as her, to have a God beg her to go with him? A God that she loves?
Everybody keeps saying Percy would never want immortality, but do you really not think that he must see the benefit of it? To be free from deadly quests, to exist outside the clutches of fate to a degree, to never be threatened with death ever again?
But both Percy and Sally are so uniquely good that they understand that despite all the endless power and stability this will bring, it will also rip apart their freedom? Their chance to be who they are without being dictated by another and also beacause their's a chance to do some good for the sake of the world.
Percy can only think of it that way because the woman who raised him has thought of it in the same way.
Annabeth represents all Percy's demigod life holds, so obviously, he looks at her at what she's come to represent in order to make the final choice. But Percy's answer should tell you how much thought he put into what he wanted instead, so yes to protect and better the lives of demigods was his first reason, not wanting to watch his mother or Annabeth and Grover die also played its part.
But I the biggest impact must have been that Sally Jackson, his mother, the one person Percy looks up to the most turned down immortality, and he has been aware of her reasons since he was 11. He had long a time to dwell on it himself. In the end, even Poseidon seems to see Sally's resolve in Percy. Like mother like son, and I don't think this gets enough credit as one of the main foundations of Percy's decision.