Teresa released an arrow at the large mosquito that was leading the monster pack. She drew another as the first planted itself in the lead creature's eye, taking the chance to shoot another.

It had only been thirty minutes since her fight with the goblins when she had found more monsters. A quick <Identify> had revealed they were all large mosquitos, the same kind of monster Teresa had fought in the first wave.

Crazy enough, they were all lower level than Teresa herself. She managed to kill all four of them with her bow before they even reached her, making it an easy fight. Teresa was having a blast, these fights were completely different from the waves. During the waves, Teresa and her party had been the ones being hunted. They didn't have a choice in whether they fought or not, and they never knew what monster they would be facing next.

Now? Teresa was a living, breathing monster murder machine. She had killed the eight goblins without receiving a single injury, and had now made extremely short work of some mosquitos. She saw more movement in the general direction that the compass pointed, and she decided to take yet another detour to hunt some monsters.

Teresa wasn't sure what was waiting for her at these monster strongholds, but she imagined this quest was still designed for a full party of five. She would need all of the levels she could get before taking on a stronghold.

Thankfully, the monsters seemed to become more common the further she traveled. The next pack of monsters was made of those vampiric cordyceps deer from wave two. There were seven of them, and they were all higher level than Teresa. They ranged from levels 7 to 9, though none of them seemed to be acidic like the miniboss from the wave have been.

Teresa herself hadn't gotten the chance to really fight the deer since she had been injured during the first wave. She was looking forward to the chance, once more setting down her bag and readying her bow as she got in range.

The deer spotted her and charged towards her. Teresa carefully aimed her first shot and fired, hitting the lead dear right in the head. These creatures were far easier to headshot. As they charged towards her, they ran head first due to the shape of their bodies. Quadrupeds like the deer would make easy targets, and Teresa continued to open fire.

They were much faster than the goblins, so Teresa only managed to take out three before the rest reached her. Instead of drawing her sword, she decided to try shooting one more arrow at very close range. By the time she had fully drawn the arrow, a deer was within feet of her.

She released the arrow, watching it plant firmly within the deer's skull. It collapsed to the ground mid sprint, nearly tripping Teresa. She quickly put her bow on her back and drew her sword now, seeing that playing a little risky with the ranged weapon had paid off.

She had put her previous unallocated point into Agility, deciding to thoroughly focus on her combat capabilities with her unallocated points while her class took care of her Intelligence, Wisdom, and Perception.

She darted towards the next deer, slashing upwards with her sword across its throat. The blade dug into the monster's neck, also releasing a cloud of spores as she cut through a fungal growth. Thankfully, the spores seemed harmless to her, even if they were cordyceps. The thought of that fungus creeped her out though, and she didn't really want to breathe it in if she could help it.

She had to quickly avoid a bite from one of the remaining two deer, jumping back and swinging her sword yet again. She missed completely, but swung again as the monster tried to close the gap. The blade sliced through the creature's snout, making it recoil and yelp.

The next deer was able to get the jump on Teresa and tackle her before she could avoid it. It bit down at her, but Teresa gripped its throat and pushed back with all of her Strength. The monster chomped at empty air a few times, and managed to kick Teresa in the ribs a few times.

She grunted and pushed the monster to the side, thankfully it was not too heavy. The monster quickly got its bearings together and charged again, though Teresa was ready this time with her blade leveled at its neck. The sword punctured into the deer's neck, making it collapse to the ground dead.

The last remaining, injured deer kicked Teresa in the side, unable to properly bite her with its snout cut off. With a quick slash, the last deer dropped dead to the ground. Killing the group of deer along with the mosquitos had been enough to make her hit level 7, which was great progress.

Teresa noted that gaining her first few levels had been far harder than gaining them now. Sure, she needed to kill more enemies, but her stats had improved along with her combat prowess. There had been seven deer in the second wave, and Teresa had just managed to kill seven on her own. Sure, there wasn't a miniboss amongst these deer, but the sentiment was still there.

She was stronger.

Teresa continued on in the direction that the <Tutorial Compass> pointed. She used <Healing Touch> to heal her bruised side, though <Facilitated Restoration> had already done a lot of work on its own. As she was doing this, she got a notification saying her <Mana Control> had finally reached level 4, though a quick check showed the description remained the same.

She ran into another pack of deer, which she was able to kill in a similar manner to the previous deer. She ran into a group of three Clubbers, and she knew these monsters had been worth a good amount of experience. She was far more experienced with the bow now, and was able to land multiple shots on the Clubber in the lead of the pack before any of them reached her.

These would be far harder to fight on her own, but still possible. She put her unallocated point into Agility again, as she was going to try to use a strategy she had previously discussed with Preston when they were training.

They had gotten the idea to make a crawler at the end of each wave from a video game with waves of zombies. Keeping one alive but injured would prevent the next wave from starting, giving them time to prepare. Walking around with the last creature following you was called "training," as you were leading the monster around like the head of a train.

However, in between Preston and Jake arguing about isekai Teresa had learned something else. Apparently, just leading a group of monsters around as they chased you was called training, it didn't have to be a crawler. In the zombie game they had gotten the strategy from, so long as you could run faster than the zombies you could shoot behind you as they chased you. Running in a certain pattern through a map utilizing the natural environment would let a player get through even the most difficult of waves as they could just run forever while shooting zombies behind them.

In real life, this was more difficult. For one, Teresa didn't have a gun. She had a bow and arrow. Running and shooting a bow and arrow at the same time is very hard. Very, very hard, actually. Secondly, Teresa was not faster than the Clubbers. If they were to run side by side in a straight line, the Clubbers would easily win a race against Teresa. However, she knew from experience that she could avoid a Clubber's charge consistently by dodging to the side.

Previously, it had always been a close call. Now, Teresa was able to take a few quick steps perpendicular to the Clubber just before it rammed into her, allowing her a brief moment to aim and shoot an arrow. There were three of the Clubbers, but it took a few seconds for one to get itself turned around facing the right direction again after missing their charge.

Once Teresa realized this, the Clubbers became predictable. She would shoot a few arrows into the face on one's chest, dodge, shoot another in the face, dodge, shoot another in the face, dodge, repeat until they stop moving. It wasn't exactly like training a zombie in the way Preston and Jake had described, but it worked. A little over thirty arrows later, two of the Clubbers were dead and the last was incredibly injured. Teresa continued to fire until she ran out of arrows, forcing her to draw her sword.

She would have preferred avoiding close combat with these monsters in particular, but it couldn't be avoided now. At least the last one was injured, as its chest looked like the back of a porcupine.

She managed to avoid the monster swinging its clubbed head at her, and darted underneath the creature. She quickly swung her sword above her as high as she could reach, disemboweling the Clubber in one motion. One of the Clubber's legs managed to kick her in the calf before it went down, likely breaking Teresa's leg.

She winced but wasn't too worried. She activated <Healing Touch> on the injury, not even feeling particularly upset she had gotten injured. The Clubber fell to the ground, dying shortly after from its injuries. Hell, getting injured was probably a good thing. This would let her get some more experience for her healing skills.

Teresa was still experimenting with her skills and improving her control over them between fights, but nothing provided as much experience as using them in a battle. Both of her healing skills were a little over halfway to level 4 by the time she finished healing, and she immediately moved on towards the nearest monster stronghold.

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Along the way, she ran into two more groups of mosquitos and another pack of deer. Most interestingly of all she encountered a pack of goblins with a Shaman. There were eleven goblins in this group, though Teresa was willing to risk it to take them on.

She tore a rag off her sleeve and wrapped it around her face, knowing what to expect from the upcoming fight. The pack of goblins spotted her, and as she expected the Shaman sent a poisonous cloud of gas at her. The goblins laughed and cheered, watching as their prey was engulfed in poison.

An arrow shot out, planting itself into a goblin's face. The goblins stopped laughing, seemingly stunned by the incident. The brief shock granted Teresa the chance to kill another goblin, and she continued to fire arrows into the pack.

The goblin Shaman wasn't strong enough to hurt her. Teresa's rags allowed her to breathe alright, and her <Facilitated Restoration> was actually enough to rapidly heal her eyes as the gas dried them out. Aiming was still made more difficult, but it wasn't impossible.

As a matter of fact, the poisonous cloud was actually incredibly beneficial to Teresa. It acted like a protective shield, as any goblin that got too close to her would begin to choke and die. She reached level 8 mid-fight, and decided to put her unallocated point into Fortitude to bring it up to a 6. This would help her eyes withstand the poisonous gas, as she actually had an idea that involved the Shaman.

One by one the goblins died. By the time the goblins grew the nerve to charge her altogether in the poisonous gas, they were too few in number to survive her barrage of arrows as they grew closer. Of the original eleven goblins, only the Shaman remained. Teresa approached the Shaman, noting with interest that the goblin's eyes were wide with fear.

She kicked the goblin in the chest, sending it tumbling onto its back. She quickly kneeled down on top of the goblin, pinning it to the ground as she gave it a pat down. Teresa found a knife tucked into the Shaman's waistband, though that seemed to be its only weapon aside from its staff.

Teresa stood up and threw the knife as far as she could, then left the Shaman alone to go collect her arrows. The Shaman got to its feet, and continued to frantically shoot poisonous gas at Teresa. The goblin spoke in an unknown language to itself, though Teresa got the impression it was trying to calm itself for some reason. Probably had something to do with her <Translate> skill that hadn't seen much use.

She calmly collected the arrows from the goblin corpses, keeping an eye on the Shaman. Thankfully, it seemed too scared to try anything but poisonous gas. The monster wasn't too bright, as the poisonous gas very clearly wasn't working for it, but Teresa wasn't complaining. She had noticed the constant exposure to the gas kept her <Facilitated Restoration> constantly healing her eyes, giving her a steady income of experience.

Additionally, the poisonous gas had worked to her benefit during the fight. If she could bring the Shaman around with her, it would make hunting monsters for experience become easier. She wasn't sure how cooperative the goblin would be, but so long as it kept shooting poisonous gas at her she was happy.

She managed to recover all of her arrows without any incident, and approached the Shaman once more. The goblin began to speak, looking like it was trying to threaten her, but Teresa didn't pay it any mind. She punched the goblin in the face, breaking its nose and stunning it. Seizing the moment, Teresa tackled the goblin to the ground again, holding a variety of goblin weapons.

Some of the weapons had rope to tie the parts together or used rope to create a grip. Alternatively, the rope would be great to keep the Shaman restrained during travel. With quite a bit of struggling, Teresa managed to bind the Shaman's hands behind its back, and the poisonous gas was no longer being emitted.

Teresa wasn't too upset about that, as she would need to conserve the goblin's Mana. Even while bound, the Shaman thrashed about and began to chase her. Teresa was able to avoid it by walking at a brisk pace, and she began to lead the goblin towards her objective.

The <Tutorial Compass> still pointed in a featureless direction as far as Teresa could see, but her Perception would improve with more levels. It was at 14 right now, which would have made it the highest in the party. A lot of her stats had seen an improvement, especially her Intelligence and Wisdom.

Status:

Name: Teresa

Race: Human (Earth)

Level: 8 (F) (10%)

Class: Healer lv 1 (F) (62%)

HP: (84/85)

Stamina: (76/85)

Mana: (286/299)

Strength: 8

Fortitude: 6

Endurance: 7

Vitality: 7

Agility: 9

Intelligence: 26

Wisdom: 22

Perception: 14

Unallocated Points: 0

<Skills> {

<Translate: lv 0 (1.3%)>

<Mana Control: lv 4 (3%)>

<Healing Touch: lv 3 (61%)>

<Facilitated Restoration: lv 3 (59%)

<Identify: lv 3 (48%)>

}

<Titles> {

<System Newcomer>

<Tutorial: Power Hungry>

<Tutorial: First Stage Completionist>

}

Doing some quick math, she had 99 stat points in total. One more and her total stat points would be in the triple digits. Thankfully, it wasn't long before she spotted movement once more.

The desert was surprisingly teeming with life, considering the vast amount of nothingness. Teresa had run into multiple monster groups today, and it was still early afternoon.

The next pack of monsters were Clubbers once again. There were five of them, a little more than what Teresa would normally be willing to go up against. As a matter of fact, she would have completely ignored this group if she encountered them just half an hour ago, but she had a goblin Shaman to weaponize.

Seconds later, the goblin Shaman was tackled, untied, and given its staff back. Teresa had tried to figure out how the staff worked, but her Mana didn't do anything with it. Maybe if she had gotten the <Appraise> skill, she could have figured out how the staff worked, and maybe she wouldn't have even needed to leave the Shaman alive.

Still, <Identify> had been a good choice. Being able to determine what an enemy was at a distance and even see their level was incredibly reassuring, and it had even let her know the previous pack of goblins had a Shaman with them ahead of time.

That very Shaman began to fire poisonous gas at Teresa the moment it got the chance, which was perfect. She approached the pack of Yectin Clubbers, glad none of them were considered "Royal" like the Clubber miniboss had been. She drew her bow and began firing as they charged towards her, ignoring the Shaman.

Teresa dodged the first charge, then the second, then the third. There were multiple Clubbers, all either charging at her or swinging their clubbed heads to try and crush her. She had some experience avoiding their attacks, but the onslaught was so constant she didn't have time to launch any attacks of her own.

Thankfully, the Shaman took care of the offense for her, even if it was unintentional. The Clubbers began to slow down and choke, giving Teresa a chance. She drew her sword and began darting beneath the choking Clubbers, disemboweling one after another. Within minutes, all five were dead and Teresa only suffered minor injuries that were healed automatically by <Facilitated Restoration>.

It hadn't been enough to gain her a level, but she still made a lot of progress. She was over two thirds of the way to level 9 already, and she was close to another class level up. Things were going great for her.

She repeated this process on her journey a few more times, fighting a pack of mosquitos and even another pack of goblins. Weaker enemies like the mosquitos and goblins were giving less experience now, and she just barely crossed the threshold for level 9 by the time she finished off both packs.

This brought her total stats up to 104, making Teresa proud of herself. Or at least it should have brought it up to level 104, but crossing the 100 point threshold had given her another title.

<Tutorial: Level Pioneer>

Be the first to reach 100 total stat points in your Tutorial party. +1 all stats.

She had gotten yet another Tutorial based title, giving her +1 to all stats. This had brought her total stat points up to 112, and she felt absolutely fantastic.

A loud rumbling interrupted her thoughts, and the Shaman that had still been shooting poisonous gas at her stopped and began screaming in a panic. Teresa looked around for the source of the sound, and she saw a horde of what looked like Wyvern-Fish in the distance. There were 13 of them, which was quite a lot, but Teresa might be able to take them on now. She'd have to be careful of the fire, but-

She froze, having used <Identify> on one of the Wyvern-Fish.

{Flawed Wyvern-Fish (F) (lv 29)}

Several of the Wyvern-Fish were above level 20, many were close to even level 30. Teresa would stand no chance against these enemies, and knew she had to avoid them. Oh well, at least her <Identify> had come in handy. Now she just had to walk the other way-

The Wyvern Fish were rapidly approaching her direction. The Shaman continued to scream, which was likely drawing their attention. Shit. Teresa thought fast, and stabbed the Shaman in one of its legs. The Shaman shrieked, falling to the ground. After grabbing its staff, she began to sprint as fast as she could away from the scene.

She was now comparable to an Olympic athlete herself, running far faster than what any 5 foot 3 woman should be capable of. Around three minutes of running later, she received a notification.

You Have Slain {Goblin Horde Shaman (F) (lv 8)}

Experience Granted

The Wyvern-Fish had found the Shaman, meaning they were close by. Teresa continued running, hoping the Shaman would have bought her enough time to get away.

For as strong as Teresa had gotten, there was always a bigger Wyvern-Fish.

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