Quote Originally Posted by Cassar View Post
Isn't this still a possibility? Is there any confirmation that the Venat we met in Elpis is the same Hydaelyn we fight against in present day?

Remember the Y'shtola quote:
"The implications of temporal magicks are not entirely understood, and so we cannot assume that our Hydaelyn and the Venat you met in Elpis are one and the same. Nevertheless, due to Her intrinsic qualities as an all-powerful being, I'd wager that Hydaelyn possesses the knowledge we seek."
Before you depart Elpis, she theorises that there will be a conjunction of timelines. When you encounter her during the trial, she claims the timelines have now converged and refers back to the encounter in Elpis and the question she posed to you there. The answer Yoshi gave during the Q&A on the topic of timelines was this:

Q: I don’t really understand why the Warrior of Light messing around in Elpis didn’t create any alternate timelines. What happened?

A: Well, I think the most important thing is that you can come up with your own theories for this one. In my personal interpretation however is that the timelines were always the same. Another interpretation you can have is that maybe Venat worked really hard behind the scenes to ensure the timeline didn’t go awry. Therefore the Warrior of Light was always acting in accordance with this plan of Venat so the timeline that we are aware of didn’t change when we went back to the affected. I personally think that when we went to Mare Lamentorium and we first met Argos and Argos really took to us when we were able to ride it, that's basically the proof that at that point, the timeline is going accordingly. We are adding all these stuff to New Game+ in 6.1 so if you’re interested in this I suggest you replay it and think about these questions when you’re playing it.
And I think this "another interpretation" is supported by the below as well:

Emet-Selch: So, here I am, Venat. I suppose you needed me to tie it all together, these frayed threads of our history─but knowing you, I suspect there's a joke in it too. Oh yes, I can imagine you gloating over my forgetfulness.
Bearing in mind she deliberately engineered Emet's escape:

Q: I am interested to know how unsundered Ascians such as Lahabrea, Elidibus and Emet-Selch avoided being kicked into 14 pieces by Hydaelyn.

A: As you think back to the text towards the end Emet-Selch did imply that Venat let him live unsundered. In fact Venat did intentionally leave a tiny floor in her Sundering attack - a crack that Emet-Selch can wiggle through. Sort of like…yes it was a powerful attack but intentionally chose to do it in this fashion. So we said this in the actual game as well which is when Hydaelyn did the attack, it was a really strong one. It was delivered at the limit of her power so she couldn’t really fine tune it. So as intentional as this was when she did that big massive light attack that sundered the world, she couldn’t guarantee that Emet-Selch would live and she was kind of making a gamble. In fact what happened was, at the time that Hydaelyn performed the sundering, Emet-Selch was with Lahabrea and Elidibus (the time he was already out of being Zodiark core so he’s a little bit different than his original but nevertheless he was there) so they ended up joining forces, and escaped to the rift without being Sundered. You may recall if you read Tales of the Shadows that Elidibus, when he came out of Zodiark he ended up losing some of his memories as well as some parts of himself and that’s sort of the point in Patch 5.3 and when he “dies” you sort of know that he lost a lot in the process as well just like Emet-Selch. So yeah, basically they worked together at that time and escaped being Sundered.
While they could come in and say no, it's not the same one, I think all the evidence we have is pointing to them being one and the same.