The Ash Giants

The Ash Giants (also known as the Ashborn) are a minor faction, and a type of NPC and enemy encountered in Outward.

Locations

 * Giants' Village is the home of the Giants, and is the only current location where peaceful Giants are found.
 * Under Island near Giants' Village contains a book on on Giants' society and culture, written by a human who studied them many years ago. According to Gold Belly, it was placed there because most Ashborn do not understand human writing.
 * Outside of Giants' Village, the player can find hostile Ash Giants and Ash Giant Priests.

Members

 * Highlord Cyr
 * Gold Belly
 * Iron Sides
 * Silver-Nose
 * The other Giants at Giants' Village, which have no dialogue.

Enemies
Giants can also be encountered as aggressive enemies. Most of these Giants are those who have been exiled from the Giants' Village.
 * Ash Giant
 * Ash Giant Priest

Lore
The only available lore on Giants comes from the Giant Book, descriptions from items, and dialogue with NPCs.

Giant Book
The Giant Book contains many important observations about Giant culture.

"Ash Giants believe that death is final, and that only the works that have been created in porcelain and ash-silk endure beyond death. They do, however, believe in passing down the wisdom of their ancestors via these crafts to educate and guide their descendants."

"Families of deceased giants will give a heart from the dead to the local Highmonk, who will use their craft to merge the stone heart into their porcelain art, so that some part of the giant's life will endure beyond their death. The Highlord will then commission a silk banner to reflect that giant's deeds and knowledge."

"The only crimes that are unforgivable across all of giant society are the murder of a silk-weaver or a porcelain-crafter. For every other offence, it is possible to seek forgiveness after the period of exile, although each giant tribe uses their own discretion for whether or not to forgive a crime."

Items
There are multiple Artifact items associated with Giants' lore.


 * Starchild Claymore: The Dawn Weaver’s knowledge showed us the way; He came from the stars, and to the stars we shall follow.
 * Sunfall Axe: The Dawn Weaver's knowledge remade us; we grafted porcelain to our flesh.
 * Skycrown Mace: The Dusk Father's knowledge made us all kings; we built our sky castles under the earth.
 * Dreamer Halberd: The Dusk Father's knowledge is universal; even lesser beings can learn what we have been taught.
 * Worldedge Greataxe: The Dusk Father's knowledge is eternal; this world is but one stop in His travel across the great void.

Other items relating to Giant culture include:


 * Giant-Heart Garnet
 * Giantkind Halberd
 * Giantkind Greataxe

Dialogue
Most dialogue that explains Giant culture can only be obtained during the Ash Giants faction quest for the Blue Chamber Collective.

From Gold Belly in Giant's Village:"Position is decided at birth by the two heads of Giant Government. There is the Highmonk who serves Dusk Father, and is master of the porcelain arts, and there is the Highlord, who serves Dawn Weaver and is master of the Ash-Silk. The Highmonk has big influence over people, as Dusk Father is one who breathed the life into us when we were just clay and cinder. People listen to him, because the Dusk Father speaks through him and his porcelain. The Highlord holds the real power. He speaks for the Dawn Weaver, who weaved the fabric of Ashborn society, and so he decides what is part of Ashborn society, and what is not."

- Gold Belly

From Cardinal Bourlamaque in Monsoon:"Ah, the Ash giants... They're a very traditionalist and peculiar bunch. We tried sending messengers of our own when they first landed on Aurai. We did not get any real results. They believe that long ago, their ancient ancestors lived on the Scarlet Moon, but that they advanced too quickly and killed their world, causing the world's blood to stain the ground red. Their creation myth says that a single stone of ash and cinder escaped the Scarlet Moon and fell to our world. Then, they say the Dusk Father forgave their crimes, and breathed life into the ash and cinder, and thus the giants were born. To stop them repeating the past, the Dawn Weaver taught them the art of weaving Ash-Silk, and how to create a lasting society. They never forgot the destruction of what they believe was their home, and are thus very slow to change. They call The Scourge the "Earth Beasts" and many believe their appearance signaled the beginning of the destruction of Aurai, just as they believe the Scarlet Moon was destroyed. They are, however, perplexed as to why it stopped. They noticed the ray of light above Monsoon, but I doubt they understand what it, or the Vigils are. As far as the more superstitious Giants concerned, the humans that started the end times managed to stop it, and they carried on with their lives. Sadly, I doubt they will ever accept Elatt. They do not believe that anything mortal could become divine. To them, the Dusk Father and Dawn Weaver are divine purely because they are not tainted by mortal concerns."

- Cardinal Bourlamaque

Deities
The Giants believe that Dusk Father and Dawn Weaver are the creators of the Giants themselves, as well as the fabric of their society. As mentioned by Cardinal Bourlamaque, they believe that the Dusk Father breathed life into ash and cinder to create them, and the Dawn Weaver showed them how to weave Ash-Silk and create a lasting society.

Little is known about these two deities themselves. However, the five Artifact weapons which mention the two deities also mention themes relating to Giant culture, and seem to be written from the perspective of a Giant. In particular, the Sunfall Axe specifically mentions porcelain - an important aspect of Giant society, the Dreamer Halberd and Skycrown Mace mention themes relating to the important of passing down knowledge, and the Starchild Claymore mentions that the Dawn Weaver "came from the stars", which is similar to the Giant creation myth of their ancestors living on the Scarlet Moon.

Two notable statues at Giants' Village depict the Dusk Father and Dawn Weaver:   Dusk Father   Dawn Weaver  

Trivia

 * The Light Mender has a statue of the Dusk Father in his Spire. The Jade-Lich Idol and Scarlet Lich's Idol also resemble the Dusk Father statue.