Ever since we learned that Hydaelyn would be working to stop the advance of the Flood of Light on the First Shard, an idea has been percolating in the back of my mind. It's finally formed a shape that I think I can articulate, and I was wondering what folks here would think.

We know that the loss of the Thirteenth Shard to the Void is considered to be Igeyorhm's great failure. She pressed her agenda too energetically, the Balance of Light and Darkness shifted too to quickly toward the latter, one-time heroes wielded the power of Primals and were twisted in body and mind, and the chaos of it all ushered in the great Flood of Darkness that tore the Shard apart, leaving only the Void and the aether-thirsty remnants of those who'd once lived upon it.

We know that it was a failure, but lately I've started to wonder if it was a deliberate and calculated move on Igeyorhm's part. We know (or, at least, it is implied) that Hydaelyn can slow or stop a Flood of Light - but is there anything she can do about a Flood of Darkness? Presuming she cannot tend to Darkness like she could Light, it seems logical that the one who COULD would be Zodiark.

That, I think, was Igeyorhm's plan. Zodiark had only very recently been imprisoned, Hydaelyn was at or near the height of her power, so the odds were very much against the Ascians at that point. The worlds post-Sundering were relatively new, not yet two millennia old. Igeyorhm decided on her own initiative that she wasn't interested in the long game that the other Ascians were playing, and decided to force Hydaelyn to release Zodiark NOW, by creating a crisis only Zodiark could avert: A Flood of Darkness. Hydaelyn would be forced to either free Zodiark, or allow the world to fall to ruin.

Unfortunately, she hadn't counted on the fact that Hydaelyn had become attached to the new life that flourished on these new worlds. While Hydaelyn did not want to see a world destroyed, neither was she willing to sacrifice all the rest of the worlds to stop it. She empowered Unukalhai to try, but it was far too little, far too late. Igeyorhm, too, was unable to stop the ball she'd started rolling, and that was that.

I'm sure that, had it worked, the other Ascians would have applauded her bold move - but since it didn't she was marked as incompetent, and her failure catastrophic.

What do folks think of the idea that the Flood of Darkness was a calculated move on Igeyorhm's part?