Some lore clarification: - Every immortal beings eventually get corroded. When a being is corroded, they may lose their memories and may even turn against their allies. Our clearest example of this is Azdaha. Zhongli wanted to let go of power early because he fears that one day, he'll also be corroded, and Liyue might not be prepared for it, so while he is still strong and healthy, he chose to let go power and push Liyue to grow on their own (under his hidden watch). As for why this is relevant in the topic of Ei, Ei had the exact same concern as Zhongli. Her solution to avoid corrosion is to discard her flesh and make a synthetic body instead, and then shift her consciousness into Makoto's sword and place that in that synthetic body. She wasn't running away nor hiding. She was eliminating a threat to Inazuma before it became one (the potential of her being corroded and destroy Inazuma). This is also why Ei programs Shogun to resist her if Ei ever changes her mind. Ei expected that when she does change her mind, that would only happen when she is already corroded, hence Shogun should then stop her from destroying Inazuma. This, of course, turns out to be a miscalculation on her side, but the intention was a good one. - Ei didn't know as much as she claimed she does. When we took a walk with her around Inazuma, you can see how oblivious she is to how Inazuma has changed in the past 500 years. She wasn't even aware of the changes that happen right outside her doorstep. This tells us that Shogun wasn't programmed to tell Ei everything ('only those that pertains to Eternity' as Ei clarified). - Ei has seen the death and destruction of Khaenri'ah. A nation destroyed due to too much progress. Obviously, she didn't want Inazuma to be destroyed, and hence she changes the ideal from Transience to Eternity. An unchanging Eternity that limits progress as much as possible so as to prevent the nation from turning into Khaenri'ah 2.0. - As for VHD, Ei valued her people's lives over ambition. She has seen many lost their lives due to chasing their ambition, and Ei wanted to prevent any future cases. This is why she approved VHD despite knowing that the Fatui was involved. Also, as mentioned in point 2, while Ei approved VHD, she didn't know much of the details that follows. - This is where Traveler comes in. The enemy of Eternity, which is obviously something Shogun has to report to Ei by her programming. It grabs Ei's attention in one glance and Ei chose to test them. When Traveler came in PoE the second time and the 99 visions awakened, Ei was shown not only the wills of those 99 allogenes, but also the fact that some of them were willing to die for their dream. This makes Ei's plan for VHD to preserve live irrelevant because her people are willing to throw away their lives to keep their vision (and ambition by extension). This is why it was easy for Ei to decide to abolish VHD. Sakoku, on the other hand, took her longer to decide as it involves the nation's progress moving forward and potentially meeting the same fate as Khaenri'ah.

TLDR; While Ei is short-sighted and a rather lacking governor who didn't understand her people well, her intention is as it always has been: to protect the people of Inazuma. She thought that her children would be happier living a stable life even without any ambition, but her children shows her that they would rather choose death over an ambitionless life.

If Morax is like an old grandpa training/guiding/testing/pushing his grandkids into danger, so that they grow up faster - while he can still watch over them - before his eventual 'death' (or in this case, corrosion), Raiden is an overprotective mom who makes every decision for her children using her own standard of what she thinks is best for them (without realizing that her children are old enough to make their own decision).