Quote Originally Posted by Rosenstrauch View Post
I know that some folks really want there to be some disastrous downside to the Ancients' world or their way of life but, to be frank... between Emet's Selch's illusory Amaurot and the short stories set during that era, nothing has ever been shown to even suggest this is the case. The worst thing anyone can say about them is that, despite being nigh-immortal demigods in their own right, the Ancients were still every bit as human as their successors races.

They weren't creatively sterile—at least two sidequests in Amaurot were dedicated to showing their efforts to create, along with the entirety of two level 80 dungeons (Akadaemia Anyder and Anamnesis Anyder). They weren't infertile, either—they mistake the WoL and friends for children upon our arrival to Amaurot, something that wouldn't make much sense if they didn't know what a child was or couldn't have them. Hell, one of the most popular takes on Elidibus's character is that he was a literal child (he's never called as such, but that scene near the end of 5.3 does suggest the possibility). They weren't a cult of evil conformists who reacted to any display of individuality with murder or brainwashing. And yes, I have seen that take before and it's as ludicrous as it sounds.

Is it really that hard to accept that—whatever nefarious things the Ascians are up to now—the people they once were didn't deserve to be driven to extinction?
It seems to be something hard for people to swallow because there’s this notion of they were either perfect beings or weren’t. In my mind, there’s no such thing as a perfect society or perfect beings, but they were pretty far up there. I think part of the reason why it might be hard for people to think that way(besides people just seeing every single thing as black and white good vs evil) is that typically in games, something like the sundered situation would be the “norm” of the story or world. Whereas something like the ancient society would be the abnormal. In 14’s case however it’s the opposite. The Ancient world is the norm. The sundering was a tragedy with grave consequences and is certainly an abnormal occurrence. As far as the Elidibus thing goes...that’s been debunked via other languages. Hes the same age range as graha aka early twenties at the youngest. People just took the size difference far too literal.