Dawntrail's Final Zones destroy everything the story has built.

[Granyala]

Sorry to be that guy byt, Actually, that is incorrect, they require ether, not souls, souls are made of ether which is why it is so convenient.

They require LIFE FORCE. A special kind of aether, if you so will. It was also stated that other forms of energy have been tested and do not work.

So yes: they will KILL everything and everyone on the source and all other shard worlds to keep their machinery running. Sphene stated that VERY EXPLICITLY.

We're not mass murderers. These people already HAD their life and are now artificially sustained as a shadow of their former selves (their memories are HEAVILY censored, lest they would be unhappy being trapped in the system). That is the very big difference to Emet Selch who would kill the living before they even had a chance at a life.

Also: We're simply acting in self defense. It's a "them or us" situation here. With "us" not just being "us" on the source but potentially all inhabited worlds in the cosmos, as it would only be a matter of time until the remaining reflections and the source have been used up and Sphene turns to other inhabited worlds.

The problem is how many plot holes surround sphene. Take the part of tural that got absorbed by the barrier, why does sphene welcome them and make them into alexandrian citizens creating more endless for herself when she could have forcibly harvested them to power the endless like she planned for the rest of tural

Because that would accomplish the same thing, in the end. They can kill and harvest you RIGHT NOW. Or they can make you a citizen and harvest you when you die of old age. That's why she asked us "Do you want to become Alexandrian citizens?" with hopeful eyes when we ask her what help she'd need.

Also, I reckon, the hard programming took over more and more the more dire the situation got.