Diablo 4 players still haven't found a cow level, but they did just find the next best thing: a secret boss battle with piles of loot

I love when developers sneak secrets into their games without any hints whatsoever. Path of Exile 2 hid an entire subclass in its previous season that you could only get by fighting a unique boss on a specific class. People had to figure this out by word of mouth when someone accidentally pulled it off.

The Diablo series is known for the secret cow levels that Blizzard playfully refuses to acknowledge despite revisiting the reference in several games. Diablo 4, however, doesn't have one yet, no matter how hard people are still trying to find it with every new update.

All the people who haven't given up hope and continue to scour the world for clues were probably thrilled to discover Blizzard quietly included a secret boss event in the latest season. While everyone was busy playing their new paladins, others were playing with body parts dropped from bosses trying to find a use for them. And they figured it out over the weekend.

As you cycle through the new seasonal activities, you'll encounter some familiar demon lords from Diablo's story. They're the lesser evils (as opposed to the prime evils like Diablo) and they drop corrupted body parts you can use to summon a world boss. It's a straightforward system that gets you to ping pong between dungeon types until you have enough to call in the big guy.

But players quickly noticed that sometimes these corrupted body parts would drop as purified body parts, a "purified claw of Andariel" or a "purified eye of Belial". None of them work like the corrupted variants for the boss, which led to folks poking around looking for something to use them on. It didn't take long for them to find four altars in seemingly random places in the world that purified body parts can be used on. When you place all four, a portal opens that takes you to a dark arena with the name "?????????."

After a beat, four separate bosses show up to fight in an all-out brawl. Defeating them nets you heaps of loot, including a unique horse cosmetic and a crafting material that lets you make one of the best items in the game. You can bring your friends along too, even if they haven't found the purified items.

It might take a while to find all four purified items. They seem to be pretty rare drops, and one of the bosses that drops them only shows up every few hours. I'm just going to keep playing and hope I get one of each over time, but I'm sure there are people grouping up for the sole purpose of farming this little event.

This secret has convinced me that the cow level will be real in Lord of Hatred. Blizzard went through all this trouble for just a season, so that must mean it's going to go big for the expansion, right? Right? I sure hope so because I'm not sure Diablo 4 can be a real Diablo game if there isn't a cow level.