It's not meant as a punishment. Dude's got himself a lot of survivor guilt, as well as possibly inventor guilt.

The Crown of Days saps someone's life to give someone else strength. It takes two seconds to figure out how that could be used for evil.

Shadow powers are generally cast into the bad side, too. What if he made the Vicereine turn into a despot with the power she weilds?

Fortunately, that isn't in the cards, but the potential is there, and our guy can see it.

What he can't see is that his presence is enough to stop it happening.