Why was Sharlayan abandoned?

[Iscah]

Finally, and most importantly to me, they allowed people to remain behind in the evacuation if they wished to.

That's the strangest part, if anything. They were on the verge of making contact with Hydaelyn Herself – a phenomenal achievement – and not a single scholar opted to stay behind and complete that research instead of fleeing? Or return at the first possible opportunity once the Garleans had been driven back?

[GoldStarz]

That's the strangest part, if anything. They were on the verge of making contact with Hydaelyn Herself – a phenomenal achievement – and not a single scholar opted to stay behind and complete that research instead of fleeing? Or return at the first possible opportunity once the Garleans had been driven back?

The Garleans weren't driven back until at least the calamity, arguably not even until ARR or SB. Keep in mind that it wasn't the invasion of Eorzea that set them on guard but the capture of Ala Mhigo/Gyr Abania. Also, we don't have any information on how many chose to stay behind, all we know is that at least Matoya did.

I don't think it's too strange that most people would chose their immediate safety over the Antitower, especially since given the breadth of Sharlayan's fields of studies I doubt the majority of people there were aetherologists.

[Iscah]

Also, we don't have any information on how many chose to stay behind, all we know is that at least Matoya did.

Actually we do, from the quote Moose posted earlier, which describes Matoya as "the lone individual who chose to remain behind".

I don't think it's too strange that most people would chose their immediate safety over the Antitower, especially since given the breadth of Sharlayan's fields of studies I doubt the majority of people there were aetherologists.

Most people, certainly. But I find it potentially suspicious that not a single person involved in the project would want to stay and work on it as long as they could, even if the overall colony was evacuated.

[Katie_Kitty]

I'm fully expecting it – and wondering whether it has anything to do with the Antitower and what they found by burrowing into the aetherial sea.

The whole thing seems way too important to discover and then just abandon.

yeah it's definitely pretty shady to me. The idea of digging down into the core of the world, discovering what is essentially a direct line to a being you consider a god, and then just... leaving it there seems really strange to me.

I'm just not sure if there's anything down there we don't know about. We've already been down there, so surely we've seen everything the Sharlayans did.