What's the point with that quite lackluster story in Endwalker?

[Skyborne]

I didn't want to make a new thread for it, but I've been thinking about how the 8UC (or 'original') timeline would turn out for the Ancients. The WoL is dead, Emet & Elidibus are still alive so Fandaniel can't carry through his plans, and Hydaelyn is further weakened. Let's assume the Ascians meet their rejoining goals. You think Hydaelyn would go for a round 2 sundering or finally concede that she needs to tell them the truth to deal with the still present danger of Meteion? Would they trust anything she says at that point?

Course, the WoL can still be reincarnated and the Ascians are unlikely to reach their goal before the WoL is in fighting shape to stand against them (assuming that the Source recovers from the 8UC and that Hydaelyn has the strength to make the WoL her champion again).

I also can't figure out how to reconcile the time loop with the original timeline. I started to think it could be delayed with a reincarnated WoL making the trip a few decades later, but there's no Crystal Tower in the 8UC anymore so it'd have to be a different method (if one exists).

Maybe I should just headcanon that the WoL's final act before death is to use the CT one last time to go to Amaurot, tell the trio (including themselves) everything, and hope for the best. :P I'll forever be annoyed that they couldn't have just had Elpis branch into an alternate timeline where everyone is saved and Venat remains charming instead of turning into Hermes 2.0.

With the circumstances being different and not on the First, I wonder how Emet-Selch would react to meeting a freshly reincarnated 9/14ths (or further) WoL... in any case, if Hydaelyn truly cared about Mankind(tm) I'm sure she would be forced to produce the truth when Elidibus gets back into the Zodiark suit and swoops on in. Then there's the matter of the Mothercrystal and what they could do with it.

...

I find myself thinking about it again and again months later, but it is pretty ironic that she had much better PR in Shadowbringers... the ascian-focused expac. She seemed like a caring nice person who respected the Convocation, but wanted to do what she felt was right (stopping the controversial 3rd sacrifice), and the Sundering was plausibly an accident born of her conflict with Zodiark. An accident that she managed to make the best of. And there was no reason to suspect that she was involved with the Final Days... I never asked for this, but I suppose fate was sealed when she was named Venat of all things.