The Guardian of the Root collided with Cain with such overwhelming force that space-time fractured around them. The impact hurled both combatants downward, crashing through the floor of the Ninth Layer and driving them back into the Eighth.
Cain clenched his teeth as the creature's enormous frame pressed him into the lower layers, yet he refused to yield. He drove his fists into the Guardian's skull again and again, cracking its bark-like bone with every strike. But the monster regenerated just as quickly, its flesh reknitting even as Cain shattered it, and its immense strength forced both of them downward until they broke into the Seventh Layer.
Cipher, Zephirax, Amara, Arkam, Uriel, and the five generals were locked in a fierce battle against a High Lord of the Root when the sky above them ruptured.
