Easily-Missed Elden Ring Detail Hints At Brutal Lore Of The Past

Summary Elden Ring's lore is mysterious and obtuse, requiring players to piece together stories from details like item text and out-of-place objects.

The dead Giants on the mountaintops were casualties of war, killed by aberrant magic wielded by Thorn Sorcerers.

The fallen Giants, covered in thorns, reveal a deep connection to Elden Ring's lore, involving the Golden Order and Queen Marika.

A subtle Elden Ring detail opens a rabbit hole of violence, stretching back centuries into the Lands Between's past. As is usually the case with From Software games, Elden Ring's lore is deliberately mysterious and obtuse. Rarely do characters offer comprehensive explanations directly to the player, and even when they do, they almost always do so with ulterior motives. For the most part, it's up to the player to piece together stories by looking closely at certain details. Recurring trends, out-of-place objects, and item flavor text can reveal a wealth of information about the world of Elden Ring.

And since Elden Ring's map is much bigger than the average Souls game's, it stands to reason that it contains many more secrets. While many of those may be answered by the upcoming Shadow of the Erdtree DLC, others yet remain obscure. Still, some seemingly inexplicable details are already well explained in-game, if only players know where to look.

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Why Dead Giants Dot Elden Ring's Mountaintops

The Many Faces Of Elden Ring's Giants

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The bodies of dead Giants are littered around a certain area in Elden Ring's Mountaintops of the Giants region - in fact, they're even visible on the map. The Giants' graveyard is just northeast of the Foot of the Forge Site of Grace. This may seem fairly obvious. After all, the area is named for the Giants who once inhabited it, and the game makes it pretty clear that Giants have since gone extinct. However, the giants' deaths, their presence in various areas around the map, and the variation in their sizes raise countless questions about Elden Ring's lore.

The dead giants on the mountaintops are casualties of Elden Ring's war against the Giants. They were once members of the Fire Giant race who once called these mountains home. They wielded the power of a forgotten, one-eyed fire god, whose form often appears on their armor and equipment. In exchange for this power, they were made to keep the god's Flame of Ruin alive. The flavor text for the Sword of Night and Flame implies that they may have shared their knowledge with a group of astronomers who had also taken up residence in the mountains.

Elden Ring's Sword of Night and Flame can be found within Caria Manor. It scales best with Intelligence and Faith, so it's ideal for builds that use these stats prominently.

After the Erdtree was born and the Golden Order assumed its blessing, Queen Marika set out to eliminate anything that might be a threat to her. Since the Flame of Ruin could be used to burn the Erdtree, Marika ordered Godfrey, the first Elden Lord, to march his armies into the mountaintops and snuff out the flame. She failed to do so, but instead sealed away a single Fire Giant - the boss players later fight in Elden Ring - to watch over it in solitude, the last of his kind, for all eternity.

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The trolls that appear elsewhere in Elden Ring, easily recognized by the holes in their torsos by which they're often tethered to hearses, are descended from these Giants. However, none of this lore explains the gargantuan skulls often seen poking out of cliff walls in Caelid. Although their bodies are never seen in full, these titans are much bigger than the ones on the Mountaintops. Since they're buried under layers of rock, it's more likely that these creatures actually predate the Fire Giants. This could explain their origins, which aren't clearly outlined prior to their conquest of the mountains.

In short, when walking through the Mountaintops of the Giants, the Tarnished is crossing over an ancient, half-buried battlefield. That's not exactly a unique experience in Elden Ring, but it does demonstrate the Golden Order's power, along with their arrogance. Flavor text for the One-Eyed Shield reveals that Marika fought against the Fire Giants' god directly, and is believed to have slain him. They engaged in battle, not only against a race much larger than them, but also against their god, and won decisively.

How Elden Ring's Mountaintops Giants Died

It's Not Death Blight, But Aberrant Sorcery

Looking closely at the fallen Giants on the Mountaintops, eagle-eyed players may notice that they appear to be covered in vines. The immediate instinct is to ascribe this to Death Blight, a familiar Elden Ring status that has a similar visual effect. However, this isn't likely the cause of the Giants' death. Death Blight only came to exist after Godwyn died, which happened long after the war against the Giants; the tendrils of Death Blight are actually extensions of Godwyn's corpse, reaching up from beneath the ground to grasp the infected.

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It's not actually Death Blight that killed the Fire Giants, but aberrant sorcery, one of Elden Ring's magic types. In lore, aberrant sorcery is most closely associated with Elden Ring’s Thorn Sorcerers, recurring enemies who appear in various regions throughout the game. Easily recognized by their red, pointed staffs and their cloaks that conceal skeletal faces, Thorn Sorcerers wield magic that causes red, plant-like spines to sprout from the target's body. Many of them can be seen stalking the Mountaintops of the Giants, usually patrolling alongside Fire Monks and Fire Prelates.

Players can also wield aberrant sorcery by finding the Briars of Punishment or Briars of Sin spells. It's not the most powerful or varied school of magic in the game, but it can be combined with other abilities in a sorcery-focused build.

The reason the dead Fire Giants appear to be covered in thorns is because the Thorn Sorcerers, alongside the Fire Monks, played an important role in the war against the Giants. The Fire Monks cast protective spells, aimed at keeping the Golden Order and their army safe from the Giants’ powerful magic. Meanwhile, the Thorn Sorcerers apparently ran offense, attacking the Giants with aberrant magic and leaving them riddled with thorns.

Also fighting alongside them were the trolls, descendants of the Giants who turned against them for some unknown reason. Clearly, this decision didn’t serve the trolls well, as they were eventually bound to the Golden Order. They’re eternally cursed to carry the coffins of the war’s dead, while the Tarnished occasionally stop their funeral processions to claim the loot they carry.

While many players may notice the fallen Giants atop Elden Ring’s mountains, few will stop to question them. After all, by the time they’ve made it to the Mountaintops, they’ve probably already walked by hundreds of corpses, and stopped wondering why somewhere along the way. Still, these Giants demonstrate how deep even the simplest details can go. What looks like grim set dressing actually has ties to the very heart of Elden Ring lore, involving the Golden Order, Queen Marika herself, and the origin of the Erdtree.