Just want to comment on Venat a little bit. Kinda have a love/hate kind of deal.

Venat "Mary Sue" Hydaelyn effectively commits genocide by splitting Etheirys into 13 pieces, kills(sunders) every living being on the planet without giving them the option of a choice, condemns everyone to perpetual suffering in order to prevent ever reaching the point of civilization seeking death after attaining perfection so instead they chase something that can never be attained, in a crowning act of narcissism names the Source Hydaelyn after herself, decides that no one can be trusted and withholds information and deceives her friends and foes alike and condemns even more to die such as say Minfilia and several lives on the first and creates the Sin Eaters as a result, has an initial plan of kill Meteion but also has a backup plan to flee the planet although it is eventually revealed that every other planet is a dead world meaning that the finite resources of the Moonship would eventually run out so plan B would ultimately fail and she bound Zodiark to use as an Aether Battery to keep the Aether Shield up but was also siphoning a portion of that Aether to the Mothercrystal making her a monstrous parasite that feeds and hoards the Aether of others. The mothercrystal is insurmountably large and is the result of leeching Aether for 12,000 years.

Other then a few Ascians and the WoL no one and nothing criticizes her actions and is rather seen as a benevolent being that can do no wrong. Likely because every race is a "child" of Hydaelyn and they have a certain attunement towards her leaving them to have favorable opinions of her.

There is a whole lot in her characterization that can paint her as a Mary Sue archetype. And generally with time travel you can't tamper with events but I do feel she unknowingly caused alterations by encouraging you to spill the beans.

Given the nature of events you can easily see Zodiark as being more a hero and Hydaelyn the villain.

Do I think Venat is inherently evil? No but the path of evil is often paved with good intentions. A future was granted but it came at a great cost.

At which point you can objectively see Venat in 2 ways. One as a deceitful creature or as a devout follower who can understand her intentions at the cost of cruel unforgivable choices.

After all Lawful good is not Lawful nice.

But the idea of the Ancients have such powercreep that the Sundering was caused by the entity that effectively created you is interesting in both good and bad ways. Good as a twist but also bad in a "are we the baddies" kind of deal. And I also think it kinda cheapens the overall story quite a bit. It's a whole lot of "To save the world I had to destroy it".