While the story still works without this, and so this is a more what-if kind of post, it occurs to me that it could have been interesting if the SDC cast had included a female counterpart of sorts to Vennel? By which, I mean a Chosen woman who Carnelian had interacted with enough (even if not as frequently as with Vennel himself) for us to have a good idea of the kind of person she was, but whose worst actions depicted in the story were still nowhere near as bad as those of (some of) her peers?
Because all things considered, Carnelian ends up being in close proximity to only four Chosen women in the entire series (Urquentha, the unnamed elderly woman at Coomb Imago, Ykoriana and Ykorenthe). Out of these four, one is a small child, and another he doesn't even directly interact with... I feel like having a female Chosen character around who was never directly antagonistic towards Carnelian (like Ykoriana) or hurt any of his loved ones in any way (like both Ykoriana and Urquentha), even if she wasn't exactly portrayed entirely positively, could have been intriguing in terms of balancing out the cast.
And while this might have been difficult to achieve given the circumstances limiting the potential interactions between Carnelian and any Chosen women, I think it could still have been feasible without major changes? For instance, the aforementioned Imago lady could have approached Carnelian and briefly talked with him; even a short exchange could have worked well in terms of fleshing her out as a minor character.
