Sundering stuff established in the Q&A

[Veloran]

And, as a side note, saying she's ultimately responsible for the rejoinings is kinda blame shifting. Everyone is responsible for their own actions. She didn't make the Unsundered go through with their rejoining plan.

She let Emet live, knowing he would go on to form the Ascians and do the rejoinings. If she didn't want them to happen she should have just sundered him. This isn't even purely a "history refused to change" thing either, because we're told that she intentionally made that choice.

[Alleluia]

She let Emet live, knowing he would go on to form the Ascians and do the rejoinings. If she didn't want them to happen she should have just sundered him. This isn't even purely a "history refused to change" thing either, because we're told that she intentionally made that choice.

Yes, b/c the history we came from had him alive and doing what he did. And, as I said, she didn't force him to do the Rejoining plan. He still made that choice on his own, assuming tempering allowed him a choice at all. She just didn't do something that would stop him. She allowed history to play out how it was "supposed" to b/c it was the only path she knew of that would possibly get us to the good ending of mankind surviving. How does this counter do anything, but support what I said?

Not only did she know about the Rejoinings when she left Emet-Selch alive, her plan hinged upon his actions and she tried to allow him a second chance to live because she felt bad about the part he was manipulated into playing. To say that Venat has basically no issues with sacrificing lives, whether directly or by proxy, is about as text as it can be at this point. If you find that abhorrent, then you find Venat herself abhorrent.

You are saying both that she felt great guilt about the role she let Emet-Selch live out to play, and also that she felt no guilt whatsoever about messing with peoples' lives. This seems contradictory.

[tokinokanatae]

You are saying both that she felt great guilt about the role she let Emet-Selch live out to play, and also that she felt no guilt whatsoever about messing with peoples' lives. This seems contradictory.

No, I believe Venat does in general feel very sad when confronted with meaningless death or cruelty. It's just that sadness has nothing to do with any of her actions and doesn't factor into her motivations. She can be "sad" that the Ancients are too blind to follow her path and still kill them. She can be "sad" that she's mentally torturing a fundamentally kind man that hates what he feels he has to do, but still manipulate him into doing it. She can be "sad" over the lives lost in war, famine, and disease, but still create a world where all those things happen regularly.

[Alleluia]

No, I believe Venat does in general feel very sad when confronted with meaningless death or cruelty. It's just that sadness has nothing to do with any of her actions and doesn't factor into her motivations. She can be "sad" that the Ancients are too blind to follow her path and still kill them. She can be "sad" that she's mentally torturing a fundamentally kind man that hates what he feels he has to do, but still manipulate him into doing it. She can be "sad" over the lives lost in war, famine, and disease, but still create a world where all those things happen regularly.

And how is feeling sad the same as having "basically no issues", exactly? Is she callous or not?

And I did notice the quotes around "sad", implying she doesn't actually feel that emotion sincerely, but if that's the case then why bother with making sure Hades got a second chance to live(/help his friend/confront Meteion/whatever the point you want to assume his appearance in Ultima Thule had) as some kind of penance for a guilt she didn't sincerely feel? .

And isn't that act letting that sadness "factor into her motivations"? Like, she did it precisely b/c she felt badly, if we're accepting your premise.

[tokinokanatae]

And how is feeling sad the same as having "basically no issues", exactly? Is she callous or not?

Her emotions don't tie into her actions, so she doesn't have issues doing those things. She sees "feeling bad" as an acceptable price to pay as long as her actions lead to the end she desires. In that regard, no sacrifice of lives is too great as long as mankind, in one form or another, lives on.

Maybe I'm being too vague? Most normal people hesitate to do the sort of drastic actions Venat does--even Hermes has an obvious tipping point if you look at the report scene--with the suffering that ensues. Venat does not. That is callous. It doesn't matter how much she cries prettily as the Sundered stands over the dead body of their mother, because feeling that way will never stay her hand if she feels the cruelty she inflicts has a result that is worth it.

EDIT: As for her actions, RE: Emet-Selch, it's not like Venat is cruel for the sake of being cruel. She was dead and Emet-Selch's soul was half-faded. Offering a small kindness when it's within her power to do so and won't impact her larger design is not something out of character for her. We can see that in her escorting Minfilia's soul back to the Source, when it would have been just fine in the aetherial sea of the First.

[Alleluia]

Her emotions don't tie into her actions, so she doesn't have issues doing those things. She sees "feeling bad" as an acceptable price to pay as long as her actions lead to the end she desires. In that regard, no sacrifice of lives is too great as long as mankind, in one form or another, lives on.

Maybe I'm being too vague? Most normal people hesitate to do the sort of drastic actions Venat does--even Hermes has an obvious tipping point if you look at the report scene--with the suffering that ensues. Venat does not. That is callous. It doesn't matter how much she cries prettily as the Sundered stands over the dead body of their mother, because feeling that way will never stay her hand if she feels the cruelty she inflicts has a result that is worth it.

I don't think we have any evidence that Venat didn't hesitate. We are right there with her as she tries to avert the Final Days and avoid having to sunder anyone at all. And we see her reaction when we tell her what happened in the future in the first place, saying she thinks it doesn't sound like something she'd have done b/c she'd have relied on the 14 or whatever she said. Like, she didn't just jump into the sundering plan as a first resort and with no compunctions. She came to see it as something she had to do in order for mankind to ultimately survive an extinction level event.

That's not being callous. You yourself acknowledge she feels sadness for what she introduced to the world. And she cuts herself no slack in our final conversation with her. That's not "having no issues". That's having issues, but still doing it b/c it was the only course that might work, as far as she or any of us know.

"In that regard, no sacrifice of lives is too great as long as mankind, in one form or another, lives on."

I mean, she wasn't the one sacrificing lives. Again, the Ascians weren't forced to do the rejoinings. And she does stop them when she feels she can, like the First. And she opposed the third phase of Zodiark's sacrifices. Venat isn't directly sacrificing lives. And you can argue indirectly she is, by sundering ppl and giving them shorter lifespans, but considering the alternative seems to have ultimately been extinction, I can't really agree. Yes, her actions made life harder. But the alternative, as far as she or we are aware, was life ending all together.

[Skyborne]

We are right there with her as she tries to avert the Final Days and avoid having to sunder anyone at all.

Huh? Did my memories of EW already fall out of my brain? Or are you talking about Ktsis where we failed to stop Hermes/Meteion? After that whole thing she decides she'll gather some trusted followers, but it doesn't seem like she did anything to stop the Final Days from occuring in the first place -- that they showed or told us, anyway. One of my biggest gripes, since they really wanted to sell me on her being a good person who tried her best. They only went for the Answers AMV where she tries to talk to the 'nostalgic boomer' strawmen after the Final Days already hit...

The hill that my corpse will fester on is that the ascians were well within their rights to correct what they saw as a huge mistake born of Hydaelyn's fear of Zodiark's power, and to defy fate as has been the way in many FF games. They and Ardbert & co were the 'dark mirrors' and the actual Warriors of Darkness to the WoL/Scions, who were also within their rights to fight back and defy fate.　Not to mention that those calamities could be thought of as 'toughening up' people as She wanted... I think this has been said a trillion times by others though.

Brinne's post below makes me think of that JP character poll comment... 'she's co-conspirators with Hermes, isn't she?' imo that's where it nosedived for me. It's like teaching a child to swim by throwing him into the ocean in the middle of the night, then sighing and giving up on him when he washes up half-alive and with an intense phobia of all water... these kids in the shallow end of the pool with their water wings are much more resilient!

[Rulakir]

Or to go with the path she knows for a fact seems like its working. She chose to put her trust in us and our path.

I understand, but I can't accept it. There was no evidence that the WoL's future was 'working' when we had to go to extreme lengths of time travel because we had no idea what was causing the Final Days or how to stop it after 12k years. This is certainly not a path I would consider to have been remotely successful. The fact that Venat put all her eggs in the WoL's basket, frankly, shows poor judgment much like her sundering of the world (so I suppose it's still in character). It was always a gamble even if she did try to stack the odds.

I mean, she wasn't the one sacrificing lives. Again, the Ascians weren't forced to do the rejoinings. And she does stop them when she feels she can, like the First.

Except she was. People not only had to die for her they had to give up their souls for her. It's just another aspect of her hypocrisy. There also isn't any evidence she was willing or able to save the shards. They were likely always going to be collateral damage. The First is particularly tricky because the events there shape the WoL into becoming the person she met in Elpis. Her preventing the Flood of Light would dramatically change the course of history. At worst the WoL dies in the 8UC (which happened), at best there's no soul merger with Ardbert, Emet & Elidibus survive, and Fandaniel is prevented from acting upon his plans until a day the WoL faces the unsundered in a different scenario. Now that I think about it, she could've 'forestalled the coming doom' of the return of the Final Days if she had nipped the Flood of Light in the bud.