Inarius

Inarius is an angel, a rogue archangel who once belonged to the High Heavens. He is known by many titles among his followers: the Prophet, the Father, the Holy One, Creator of Sanctuary, and Father of Sanctuary. He is considered Tyrael's brother in the angelic sense, though he never sat on the Angiris Council, Heaven's ruling body. In the events of Diablo IV, he is a major character, and his death at the hands of Lilith shapes the world's fate. His story spans the creation of Sanctuary, the rise of humanity, the Sin War, and his long torment in Hell, ending with his return and final fall.

Inarius was born from the Crystal Arch, as all angels are. He was an archangel but not one of the five who formed the Angiris Council; instead, he served as an advisor to it. During the Eternal Conflict, the endless war between Heaven and Hell, he commanded part of the Heavenly Host under Tyrael. His victories in that war earned him admiration among his peers, but the endless fighting wore on him. He grew weary of the bloodshed and sought a different path, one that would eventually lead him away from the High Heavens and into forbidden territory.

Weary of the Eternal Conflict, Inarius and Lilith, a demon, gathered like-minded angels and demons who shared their desire for peace. Together they took the Worldstone from the Pandemonium Fortress, either by force or by trickery, and altered it to hide their work from both Heaven and Hell. They shifted the Worldstone into a pocket dimension and around it they created Sanctuary, a world where angels and demons could coexist without war. They ruled this new realm with a council, but even as Sanctuary enjoyed peace, fear gripped Inarius. He believed his kin in the High Heavens would eventually come for him, and that he would pay for what he saw as his sins.

Inarius and Lilith had a son at the Altar of Rites, naming him Linarian, though he would later be known as Rathma. The children of the renegade angels and demons, called the nephalem, surpassed their parents in power and belonged to neither side. Their existence frightened the renegades, and dissent spread. Some wanted the nephalem destroyed, fearing the ultimate blasphemy of angel and demon union would draw the attention of the Great Evils and the Angiris Council. Lilith killed those who wanted the children destroyed, but Inarius banished her to the Void in response. He then used the Worldstone to dampen the nephalem's power, so each generation grew weaker until they became humans. After this, he disappeared, though writings suggest he walked among humans in a form like theirs and came to favor them.

About three thousand years before the Darkening of Tristram, humans summoning demons alerted the Prime Evils to Sanctuary's existence. The Prime Evils founded the Triune, a religion designed to win humanity over to Hell. Inarius answered with his own church, the Cathedral of Light, presenting himself as the Prophet. Lilith returned secretly and created the Edyrem, followers of a farmer named Uldyssian ul-Diomed, whose nephalem powers she awakened. Inarius swore that Sanctuary was his and that he would not let Lilith or Hell take it, even if that meant destroying the world. Uldyssian's Edyrem destroyed the Triune, then his inquisitors. Inarius descended from his tower and confronted Uldyssian, first trying to convert the Edyrem with his angelic presence. Uldyssian ultimately sacrificed himself to reset Sanctuary, and when Heaven discovered the world, Inarius was handed over to Hell as part of the settlement between Heaven and the Prime Evils.

Mephisto took Inarius to the Burning Hells, where he was chained and slowly had his wings torn off. His skin was stretched on barbed hooks, and his features were distorted beyond recognition. He was said to be trapped in a chamber of mirrors with his eyelids torn away, forced to look at what he had become. This torment lasted for an unknown time, but it did not break him entirely. He endured, waiting for a chance to escape.

Sometime after the archangel Malthael's attempted genocide of humanity, Inarius returned to Sanctuary. He claimed to have escaped Hell, though the Horadrim Lorath Nahr suspected he embellished the story. The day of his return became a holiday, the Divine Advent. He found a broken world and rebuilt the Cathedral of Light around himself, gathering followers who saw him as their savior. When Rathma's Prophecy became known to him, he went to the Necropolis of the Firstborn to take a key to Hell from his son. Rathma refused, saying he had seen in a vision that the key would be taken from his corpse under the watchful eyes of the serpent. In anger, Inarius killed his own son.

In Diablo IV, in the year 1336, Lilith's chaos spread across Sanctuary. The Wanderer, the player's hero, sought Inarius's blessing in the Alabaster Cathedral to cross the Black Lake in pursuit of her. Inarius refused, calling humans weak and saying Sanctuary was wasted on the unworthy. He then led a mortal army into Hell. On the battlefield, he saw Lilith, flew at her, and threw his spear. An Oppressor blocked it, and Lilith killed him. After his death, Prava took over the Cathedral of Light. Wounded but arguably more dangerous, she declared the Wanderer and the Horadrim heretics and blamed them for his death. Lorath expected the Cathedral to keep worshipping Inarius. Inarius and Lilith are two answers to the same question about humanity: one sought to control and shape it, the other to free and unleash it. Both failed, but their conflict defined the fate of all who came after.