The Demise of the Elderlings (Spoilers for all books, especially RWC)

[Nuytsia]

Re the OP:
Point 1 - yes fairly quickly or else presumably they'd have done more to save themselves. they DID put the dragon cocoons from the beach at trehaug into the buildings, that must have taken SOME time. I do find it a bit weird that not a single elderling survived? I mean humans are alive and well....

Point 2 - I'm not sure I'd say the areas the Elderlings inhabited seemed to be a localised area. There's a lot of land between the Cursed Shores and Aslevjal island! Were the areas inhabited by the Elderlings actually targeted in some way by some deliberate attack???
It does seem like sea levels have risen (or some land sunk), and presumably the climate of Aslevjal (at least) has got a LOT colder. I think these are secondary effects of the event that killed the Elderlings (or unrelated!), as it seems whatever killed them was FAST.

Point 3 - I've often wondered where the serpents actually were coming from at the start of LST. I guess they may have drifted so far away from their nesting and cocooning grounds only because SO much time had passed that they spread out everywhere.
(minor note, I don't think other dragons would have moved into the cursed shores because climate change has made it pretty inhospitable to dragons. The 6 duchies might be better! (more food) but a bit cold. although now it looks like way upriver of trehaug is ok once you get to kelsingra) BUT i think you're right in assuming there are no other dragons.

Point 4 - Although rivers DO tend to get wider and shallower over time..... but whether enough time has passed for this to explain the Rain Wilds river changes I don't know.

Point 5 - I didn't even know there WAS a missing piece - hehe!

Point 6 - yup definite geological instability around here! (frequent earth tremors and quakes are mentioned.....)

Point 7 - Not sure where ' I think that this volcano is in the opposite directions from Kettricken's Mountains.' would be?
I presumed they were travelling North when travelling upriver.... from the map in Fool's Fate.... but the description in DH completely contradicts this when they get to the river fork. Unless South is up on the map?? (which doesn't fit with anything else). If ash from the volcano is carried downriver with prevailing wind, and Kelsingra isn't affected by ash, then isn't the volcano near Kelsingra? (aieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee)
I guess we can't be sure the current day volcano spouting ash is necessarily the same one that started all the trouble? (if that is what started it).
And I am not sure I can assume the descriptions of where ash is blowing to etc are going to fit accurately with my map in another book....... (most authors seem to have trouble with this for some reason!)

Point 8 - Hmmm what's Frengong? (am I a complete doofus?) (don't answer that)

Also - yeah the acid river that would be the way to the volcano! Now if I could just figure out if RH is saying its coming from NW or NE........ or somewhere else entirely!!!

Point 9 - You make a good point about how cut off they would be with all this acidic water, and now skill tainted water, floating around them! But did the dragons help them go elsewhere? You'd think in the initial turmoil they'd try to fly them out rather than hang around and see what happens (but were the dragons too arrogant to do this. you'd think they could save themselves at least. still a mystery why almost all dragons died out.)

Point 10 - ok I guess it's possible dragons died out progressively of old age! Wow you'd think they'd be able to sort themselves out a bit better than that. Maybe regretting not helping the Elderlings now eh dragons???? I can see Icefyre doing what he did fitting into your scenario. You'd have thought the dragons would at least have tried to 'make new Elderlings' long before letting themselves all die out. (assuming Eldering help would have prevented dragons dying out, and assuming they wouldn't want to associate with puny humans AS IS)

Point 11 - sort of blows Point 1 out of the water !!!

Hmmmm well , all in all, it's plausible!

I hadn't really considered that it could have been a long slow decline rather than a quick death of all at once. Still hard to fathom how they couldn't recover, but if those arrogant dragons declared they didn't need silly Elderlings I can sort of see it to an extent.

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I'm still going through but thought I'd comment while I had it in my head...I was certain that there was a source of memory stone in a quarry on Aslevjal (or somewhere in the Out Islands), and it was from there that the Pale Woman quarried the stone to make her dragons?

Yes I thought it was in the water at the shore? I remember Fitz first seeing it there half carved or something. I think it's certainly possible the PW brought it with her, as we know she did cart the stuff around. Then again, where would SHE have got it from? Did she visit the quarry where Verity carved his dragon??????????????????????????
Aslevjal doesn't fit very well with the other natural cocooning grounds, so I tend to think PW did bring it. It would be strange to have had Elderlings there and no dragons. It could have been a nesting ground like Others Island? (being an island). Either way, the climate is certainly much colder than in the past so I can't see dragons going near the place to lay eggs or serpents making cocoons there now.

I find it interesting that The Blood Plague has never seemed to come into contention anywhere as a possible reason for the demise of Elderlings/dragons..

I certainly think this could have been a factor, especially if it did turn out to be a longer slower demise. I think blood plague is simply a natural disease (re Lord P comments above).