He had spent most of his explorer career outside of the tougher dungeons unless he could get a group to dive in with. He was one of the better independent trap experts around. He had made a career of scouting out areas for other groups and pointing them out or mapping out areas for groups he joined. He wasn't much of a fighter himself, but he was fairly good at avoiding danger at all cost.
His hobby during his time exploring was taking pictures of the sights he came across while out adventuring. He took all sorts of pictures of the dungeons he explored, and when given a chance he was even able to film some fights as a tag along for stronger groups. His hobby started to become more of a career of sorts as he showed off all of the film and pictures he took while exploring for anyone to see through the systems network functions. In an age where entertainment was fairly nonexistent at the moment, being someone that could capture the danger and challenge of exploration so well had a lot of perks.
Eventually news stations started to show up into the hub city and he was a fairly well sought out cameraman for both major news stations. The one sponsored by the world government guild had tried to bribe him into coming along to work for them since he was such a high level explorer that actually new how to take great shots of combat, or to properly film without putting himself in to much danger. He was the dream cameraman for field work along with a few other people.
At first Bryan was thinking of joining the news station run by the world government guild, but after seeing how constrained their reporting was he didn't feel like a career with them would be something he'd enjoy. He loved filming the unexpected and the dangerous side of exploration as much as the success of dungeon dives. With the world government guild he'd only be able to show off successful things that would put the guild in a good light at all times. He'd be nothing but a backdrop that could only do as told without any creativity. That's why Bryan ended up going to the independent news crew in the end and it was a great decision.
When the expedition first started he was surprised by the size of the group as they made their way through the forest to get to the large town. Once they reached the area after a long days' worth of travel, Bryan was able to get some good shots from up on top of the hill of the town in the distance. The haze covered town was massive in comparison to any of the other towns he had seen being filmed in the past for other territory conquest expeditions. They spent the night resting and preparing for the big day. Bryan was filled with excitement and was only able to get any sleep because of how often he had to force himself to sleep while being an explorer in the past.
The next day Bryan and all of the other members of the news crew were busy filming the discussion between members of the main group for the expedition. The conversation seemed to go well as they set up a plan that Bryan made sure to film out for the documentary of the event he was sure would be major for the future. For a while he had to wait with the reset of the support group as one of the leaders of the expedition went off with a couple of other people to scout out the town. When they made it back the group got all set up to dive into town and Bryan and one other news crew member were given the responsibility of filming things on the support group's end.
Soon the entire expedition group made their way into town as they were surrounded by the oppressive haze. This wasn't the first time that Bryan had been inside a haze filled area, but it was the first time it came across as so overpowering. He had been on an expedition to film a small guild take on a much smaller town for the independent news station, but this entire experience was on a completely different level. The haze made it hard for him to even film some of the stuff that was going on, but he was able to film the looks on some of the people's faces as they dived into the haze.
When they reached the gas station the main group rushed ahead with Sarah and the other cameraman following close behind to film what they were up to. Bryan made sure to film as well just to get an outside perspective of what was happening. It didn't take long for the main group to come back after clearing the gas station. They proceeded to do similar things to different places around the area before it was time for the operation to start.
Eventually the main group went off to hunt one of the sub-bosses while the support group set up in front of the gas station. They were preparing to take on a hoards worth of haze creatures and zombies. With the size of the town Bryan was certain it was going to be a tough fight, but everyone in the group seemed extremely confidant in themselves. It was a huge difference from the nervous looks he was used to seeing from the smaller guilds he had followed to film in the past. It came as no surprise to him considering how high leveled the people involved in the expedition were.
Soon a signal seemed to have been given to the leaders of the support group as they all nodded to each other before one of the higher level rogues of the group rushed ahead towards a nearby building. The person rushed inside for only a moment before dashing out and racing towards the next building at a frightening pace. Bryan already had his camera out filming everything that was going on. The other news crewmember that stayed behind with him was also controlling some drones that flew around the area to get images from above.
It wasn't even more than ten seconds after the rogue had rushed out of the building that a large explosion caused the entire street to shake. The bottom half of the building collapsed under the power of the sudden explosion and crumbled apart. The loud explosion was followed up by the noise of the building falling down and crashing into the street below. With so much noise Bryan knew that the haze creatures in the town would soon make their appearance in large amounts. Another noise seemed to come from the distance which he knew came from the main group taking on a sub-boss. He didn't take his attention away from what was happening in front of him though.
Within seconds another loud sound rang out into the surroundings as another building had been taken down by the rogue. Bryan didn't know what kind of bombs the man had been using, but from the sheer destructive force of them he knew it wasn't something that you could just buy from the system. If that were the case then smaller guilds would buy them up like crazy since that kind of power could seriously damage a stronger beast if used at the right time. With the second building collapsing soon followed by a third the rogue made his way back to the support group and prepared to help fend off the approaching hoard that would certainly come after all of the commotion they had made.
It didn't take very long for the first signs of the hoards approach to become noticeable. There was a large amount of screaming coming from ahead of the group along with a lot of footsteps. The support group stood their ground as they waited for the hoard to become visible. The haze was still fairly heavy in the area and the dust from the buildings collapsing only made things worse in that regard. Bryan used one of his skills to turn himself invisible as he started to move around the group to get the best filming angles that he could.
Soon the massive hoard that was on its way started to become visible and the sight of thousands of zombies rushing in their direction wasn't something easy to be prepared for. All of the zombies in the approaching group were running out front head first through the rubble and towards the tanks at the front of the formation. On the other hand the haze creatures were crawling along some of the still standing buildings as they lunged forward trying to keep pace with the zombies.
Every once in a while Bryan was able to pick out a female zombie and he could easily see how different they were from the rest. They would run along with the rest of the zombies, but depending on what abilities they had they would move in different ways. Some were so fast that they moved ahead of the hoard, some simply leaped in large amounts from their superior strength, while one was a bit surprising since it was flying in their direction. Bryan got it all on film, but it was the moment when the support guild decided to start teeing off on the hoard that he was waiting to film.
He didn't have to wait long as the archers in the group started to let arrows fly into the hoard of zombies rushing over. When the arrows landed they didn't just shoot through some of the zombies, but seemed to burst into clouds of green smoke that caused the zombies in the affected areas to become more sluggish in their movements. After a barrage of archer shots, the mages of the group sent in several different spells that collided with the approaching hoard. The first spells to reach the area were a few fireballs that slammed into the green smoke causing more explosions that destroyed large amounts of zombies at a time. Other spells such as burst of lighting would bounce from enemy to enemy killing the weaker ones while the stronger ones were slowed down.
The gunners in the group had another job from the other ranged fighters and were targeting the empowered zombies as they first laid waste to the ones that were head of the pack and shot the flying one out of the air. By the time the hoard had reached the tanks out front hundreds of zombies had already been killed by the tactics that had been prepared to slow the creatures down. When they reached the tanks they were met with another major obstacle as all of the knights out front used shield walls to hold their grown. The berserkers on the other hand started to agro the empowered zombies that had survived the target firing.
With this the hoard was exactly where the support group wanted them. The battle raged on as Bryan moved around the battlefield while invisible to film as much of the battle as possible. His eyes were opened to how well the support group worked together. Even when some of the haze creatures started coming at the group from behind they were quickly taken care of by the close range fighters at the back of the group. Bryan made sure not to miss a single moment as he looked on with excitement at everything that was going on around him.