"That mountain of flabby meat... that stench of rot on a golden throne!"
Andariel seemed genuinely enraged. She had crossed paths with the Greed Queen in the Treasure Realms more than once. Those annoying little goblins turned up everywhere—even her own lair. And the experience of being pinned and pummeled by the Greed Queen's bloated form was a memory she loathed.
"Now, you have no choices left. I intend to let you feel true agony before you fade," Kulle whispered. His voice was almost tender.
How tragic that the Maiden who wished to embody Anguish had never, in all her eons of existence, understood what true pain felt like.
A colossal amount of mana surged! Kulle pumped so much energy into Andariel that her spirit-form began to swell like a balloon. Even Madawc, with his foot on her face, looked on with hesitation. It looked like she might burst at any second.
Cruel? Zoltun Kulle, who had always stood firmly on the side of humanity, saw no reason to show mercy to a Lord of Hell.
"I... AM... ANGUISH!" Andariel let out a piercing shriek.
Kulle boredly cleaned his ear with a ghostly finger. "Then you should bear all of it, shouldn't you? Daughter of Lilith and Inarius."
Kulle's tone turned frigid.
Andariel should have been a Nephalem! She should have been great, like Rathma, or the first Bul-Kathos, or Vasily! But she had forsaken her heritage to chase the hollow, visible power of the Hells.
Was Lilith powerful? Yes. But she was nothing compared to a Prime Evil like Diablo. Was Inarius powerful? Certainly. But he never held the title of Archangel.
Andariel was a fool. Shortsighted. She saw Lilith slaughtering the other angels and demons in Sanctuary and craved that immediate violence. She chose the wrong path, and that is why she became so small and wretched.
But it didn't matter now. Zoltun Kulle's dream was coming to fruition through the current Bul-Kathos.
The strongest Nephalem. Humans should be the ones standing above angels and demons! The only thing that irked Kulle was that Bul-Kathos didn't seem interested in enslaving the heavens and hells. But that was a minor grievance.
As long as Bul-Kathos stood at the apex, the supremacy of the Nephalem would become an undeniable truth.
"Now, become sustenance for Bul-Kathos. Andariel."
Kulle's eyes flickered. He hadn't come here just for her "Anguish" aspect. In his eyes, the bloodline within her—the direct lineage of Lilith and Inarius—was the real prize.
That was the key to making a Nephalem "pure." Absorbing too many external rules and aspects would eventually make Bul-Kathos lose his "humanity." This ancient Nephalem blood was what Kulle truly sought for his champion. The divine aspect? That was just a garnish.
Through the channel opened by Kanai's Cube on the Black Soulstone, a surge of power poured in! Kulle was the conductor of this symphony.
"Such a magnificent artifact, yet you lot use it to 'reforge' common legends. How ignorant," Kulle lamented. It sickened him to see Nephalem using the Cube for trivialities.
Suddenly, Andariel's spirit-form exploded.
There was no sound. This was the Black Soulstone—the ultimate cage. And with Kulle there to dampen the ripples, the explosion remained contained.
Andariel's splattered essence and soul-shards were sucked into Kanai's Cube. Simultaneously, her aspect was absorbed by the "Hope" aspect of the Archangel Auriel already within Bul-Kathos.
The two merged. Bul-Kathos began to grow stronger.
The elevation of his "Aspect" would push him toward godhood, provided his physical body could withstand the pressure. A body with infinite growth? That was unnatural. But it was the only path.
The original Bul-Kathos had to forge legendary gear to act as vessels for these aspects because his body couldn't hold them all. But this Bul-Kathos wouldn't need such crutches. Transcendence was within reach—he just needed Kanai to act as the final "stabilizer."
The Nephalem didn't need the favor of a god. They needed to be the god.
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