Teresa turned heel and activated <Dash>, not wanting to get stepped on by the giant death robot also known as the Statue Of Liberty. She activated <Inventory> and pulled out her poison staff, pumping out as much gas as she could while fastening a rag around her mouth at the same time. It was sloppily tied around her head, but it would stay on well enough.

Now, the obvious thing here was that Lady Liberty was a statue. Those don't typically tend to breathe very much, so the poison wouldn't exactly do a whole lot to the machine. However, there was another thing to take into account.

Lady Liberty was 7 levels higher than her and significantly larger. Teresa was not going to outrun this thing going at full speeds, even if she used <Dash>. The statue was fully active now, that brief period at the start of the stage where it had behaved very slowly was now over.

It was down one weapon, but it could still swat Teresa like a fly if she wasn't careful. The next best solution? Make it harder to see her. The poisonous gas wasn't particularly thick, but hopefully it would at least keep her exact position somewhat hidden from Lady-

A massive hand punched down exactly where Teresa was standing, and she narrowly avoided it purely because she noticed the massive shadow around her from the fist blocking out the sun. Fuck, Perception was a stat too. Teresa didn't think Lady Liberty would have a Perception build, but it was clear that it was still high enough to not fall for such a simple ruse.

The statue didn't stop, instead launching a kick that sent a massive plume of sand everywhere as her foot dug up the ground. Teresa put away her staff and ran to the side, knowing damn well she wasn't going to avoid this in time. Before she could get out of the way, a massive wall of sand slammed into her at the speed of a small aircraft.

Teresa was immediately engulfed in sand, getting the wind knocked out of her while getting punted like a football. <Healing Touch> activated in both hands as she tried to fix her injuries, and she realized she felt… weightless?

Sand dispersed around her and the ground came into view far below, Teresa had literally been sent flying from the strike. Lady Liberty was running to catch up to her, and it looked like she was about to volleyball spike Teresa straight down.

Teresa built up Mana in both hands, using one instance of shotgun <Embers> to redirect her out of the way of the attack. Air swooshed around her as massive metal fists swung right next to her, making her spin in the air uncontrollably. Could Teresa survive a fall from this height? She was traveling so ridiculously fast that her airtime had increased due to her gliding a little on the wind, but she was still going to splatter against the ground within a few seconds.

She activated her remaining shotgun <Embers> to try and slow down, which did not accomplish much. The air resistance had taken her out of an uncontrolled tumble, but she was still shit out of luck.

Teresa activated <Embers> in both hands, spraying out a hose of fire to try and slow her fall. Maybe if they behaved like rocket thrusters she could have a controlled landing. Teresa began to slow, but it was too little too late. She slammed into the sand, skipping like a stone on water as her body ragdolled across the desert.

Maybe she should have taken <Pain Tolerant> after all.

Teresa struggled to breathe or even move as she finally came to a still. She was buried under a pile of sand, her body not responding to any of her commands. <Healing Touch> still activated in both hands, but she couldn't move them to where she was hurt. Hell, she was hurt everywhere. Teresa did her best to manipulate the Restoration Mana from her hands to flow out and around her wrists and up her arms.

She had spent some time trying to make the little barrier that converted Mana into Restoration Mana larger, giving <Healing Touch> a larger surface area and allowing for more throughput of regular Mana. Admittedly, she had fallen out of practicing this for a while, especially after she had gotten <Embers>, but the practice she did have was proving useful.

Loud thumping sounds shook the sand as Lady Liberty ran through the desert, trying to find where the little pest had gotten off to. A group of horrified screams caught Teresa off guard, as an unfortunate group of Clubbers had an unexpected encounter with a 150 foot death machine.

The sound of sand being rapidly displaced quickly overtook the screams as metal tendrils shot out from Lady Liberty's torch, stabbing through and crushing the Clubbers and burrowing into the sand.

Teresa did not have long, and she needed another distraction. As she had leveled up, her healing magic had actually slowed down due to her decreasing amounts of forced practice. It was still ridiculously fast, but for someone with 28 Fortitude it still took a little bit to fully heal Teresa from her current state.

Fuck it, she had one option that might work. She cast <Totem Of Life>, causing a tall wooden totem to appear about 100 meters away. This was the maximum distance she could use the spell, though she had such a ridiculously small amount of practice with the skill she hadn't actually been positive just how far the range on it was. It began to produce low-quality Restoration Mana from the surroundings, although none of it was close enough to help Teresa at all.

The magic wooden totem caught the attention of Lady Liberty, and multiple tendrils from her torch began to burrow into the sand around the spell. This meant Teresa couldn't use it to help Sarah, but honestly she didn't really need it for that. She had spent so long not wanting to use it out of anxiety that she would be forced to leave the Tutorial early, only to not actually need it anymore. At least it finally got some use.

Finally healed, Teresa dug herself out from under the sand and pulled two items out of her <Inventory>. The first was the boomerang, and the second was the <Tutorial Compass>. When the Clubbers had gotten eviscerated by the angry statue, it had shown that it would attack anything and everything. The enemy of Teresa's enemy was her friend, and in that case she might be able to get an army of skeletons on her side.

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She charged the boomerang with <Embers> as she ran with <Dash>, her Mana and Stamina still doing alright. The statue was still searching the area around the totem, so Teresa had a few seconds to get some distance. It used to take several hours to reach a monster stronghold, but after Teresa had leveled up her <Dash> a few times it became a much shorter trip.

Based on how far she had been sent from Liberty Island with that kick along with her own movement speed, she should be able to get there in roughly twenty minutes. She wasn't sure if she would be able to last that long, especially while taking into account her Mana and Stamina pools, but she would have to find a way.

Lady Liberty finally decided to scoop the entire area around the totem with her hand, causing a massive wave of sand to bury the totem. Teresa felt that the totem had been destroyed, and it would only be a moment before she was being chased again. Up ahead, she saw a pack of Vampire Deer that were all roughly level 15. They spotted her, and upon seeing what was behind Teresa they immediately began to run away.

Totally a fair decision, Teresa would likely do the same in their shoes, or hooves. Unfortunately for the Vampire Deer, she needed some cannon fodder to buy her some time. She sprinted right next to the deer and chased them away from the next monster stronghold. She cast <Facilitated Restoration> as bright as she could and shot it well above the monsters, letting it work as a flare gun. Hopefully that would buy her a minute as she ran in the correct direction.

She sprinted away, eventually pausing to cover herself in sand. The deer wouldn't work as a great distraction if Lady Liberty clearly saw her running nowhere near the monsters.

Thumping soon chased after the monster pack, buying Teresa some more time. As soon as the coast was clear, she stood up and began running once again. It was difficult not to kick up a sandstorm behind her as she ran, but she managed to maintain an awkward running form that kept it to a minimum.

After about a minute of running Teresa glanced behind her, seeing that the Vampire Deer had all been killed by Liberty's torch. It was grotesque, leaving smears of dead monsters along the ground where massive metal tendrils had crushed them. Suddenly, the smears disappeared as Teresa got far enough away for the desert's visibility limiter to kick into place.

Huh, that might actually be useful. There had always been a limit to how far she could see in the Tutorial, even if it was a plain, flat desert. As Teresa's Perception had improved, this limit had slowly gotten weaker, but it was always present. The one exception to this had always been the Statue of Liberty. No matter where she was, she could always see it in the distance.

Even now, she could still see Lady Liberty hunting for Teresa in the wrong direction. Was she also affected by this limiter? That would be incredibly useful, as there weren't a lot of places to hide in such open terrain. If Teresa could always see Lady Liberty, but couldn't be seen back-

Lady Liberty eventually turned her head in the right direction, and spotted Teresa from well over a mile away. She began running towards Teresa once more, slowly eliminating the distance between the two. Alright, that plan wasn't going to work. If Teresa wanted to hide, she needed to bury herself and stay buried.

She continued using <Dash>, never pausing as she tried to push just how fast she could really run. If not for her limited Mana, Teresa would use <Embers> behind her to run even quicker. Would that work? She had no idea, but she definitely wouldn't make it to the stronghold if she wasted her resources like that.

Soon, there were more monsters in her vision. A bunch of level 24 Wyvern-Fish were along her path to the stronghold, which was perfect for her needs. Just like the Vampire Deer, they began to run for their lives as soon as they spotted Lady Liberty.

Teresa briefly wondered why so many of the monster's had any survival instincts now that she needed them to stay dumb enough to actually attack the statue, and considered the possibility that the skeletons would do the exact same thing. All she could do was hope that wouldn't happen, and she kept her pace.

Upon reaching the Wyvern-Fish, Teresa got a short distance ahead of them and turned around with her boomerang still in hand. She threw it the best she could into the air, aiming for an eye-level height with Lady Liberty. She activated the boomerang's ability, and a massive ring of <Embers> shot out in the sky, causing a burst of flames to briefly blind Lady Liberty.

The boomerang returned to her hands and she put it away in her <Inventory>, running right back at Lady Liberty. She passed underneath the statue as it stopped covering its face to search for Teresa. More molten tendrils shot out of the torch towards the Wyvern-Fish, making it a one sided slaughter. Some of them desperately tried to shoot fire out of their mouths in retaliation, but they were too slow.

Teresa pulled another set of C4 out and set it up, tossing it towards Lady Liberty's foot. She pulled out the detonator and got ready to blow it once she got to a safe distance.

Lady Liberty began to turn around as the explosive stuck to her foot, and Teresa briefly wondered if the statue could physically feel things. Did it have nerve endings? Never mind, there was no time to think about robot anatomy and physiology. Teresa activated the detonator, and an explosion demolished the foot of Lady Liberty once more.

The statue lost balance and fell, catching itself with its free hand. Initially, Teresa thought this might be a great opportunity to strike with more C4, but Lady Liberty quickly stood up once more on its stump. Molten tendrils shot out from the torch towards Teresa, making it far harder to get close in time.

She would have more opportunities, Lady Liberty couldn't properly heal without the pedestal. She would be stuck running on uneven legs missing a foot, Teresa already had her opportunity in front of her. There was no need to get greedy now.

Teresa ran a circle around Lady Liberty, avoiding tendrils as the statue tried to chase after her. It was far slower now and leaning to its good side to stay balanced, so the rest of the run shouldn't be too bad. Air whistled past Teresa as she ran, totally expecting something wrong to happen after thinking something positive about her current situation. Thankfully, nothing too out of the ordinary happened as she ran ahead of the statue towards the monster stronghold.

As it was, Teresa actually might have a chance against Lady Liberty if she turned around and fought now. The odds were not in her favor at all, but there was still a chance she could pull through. There were 3 sets of C4 remaining, making Teresa glad she had gone above and beyond during the previous stage of the Tutorial.

No, she would maximise her odds by getting the skeletons involved. She was confident the only way she would really be able to kill Lady Liberty was with C4, she didn't have any skills that packed enough of a punch to properly put the statue down for good. She could probably burn through it given enough time with <Embers>, but she couldn't imagine a situation where she could just do that without getting killed in the process.

Teresa deactivated <Dash> as she no longer needed to use it, though she noted it had leveled up again during the fight. Now wasn't the time to maximise her experience gains, she needed to conserve her resources for this marathon of a battle.

Soon, she spotted the stronghold in the distance. There were multiple archer towers, completely stone brick walls, and iron gates. Teresa didn't need to use <Identify> to know all of the skeletons present were level 30, and there would be well over 100 of them present.

Behind her, Lady Liberty was still keeping up while flailing her molten tendrils in an attempt to murder Teresa. The giant death robot was no longer the fastest thing in the Tutorial. <Dash> activated as Teresa began to sprint towards the opposite side of the stronghold, trying to put the skeletons in between herself and the final boss.

Lady Liberty should have never stepped off her damn pedestal.

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