The Slaughter at Meridian (Rift Lore)  

Meridian was the heart of all the Defiant operations. Though the walls of meridian were high and well built, they would not withstand what was coming. Among the original defiants, only Asha Catari was ever returned with any measureable power, a fluke in a long series of disappointingly mundane resurrections.

Guardian assaults were held back by Defiant technology for a short time, but the day came when Cyril himself led an army of Ascended Guardians to take it. The outcome seemed predetermined, as soldiers with the power of three men rolled against the walls of the city.

The results were, predictable, a slaughter. Meridian burned in the fires of the Guardian zealotry, and pieces of shattered machines littered the streets among the bodies of those who fell defending it.