A minute later...

'Agility is the key to my victory.' Arnold kept repeating the thought in his mind as he ran around the lizardman like an NFL player who was on steroids.

So far it was his thoughts that had kept him alive in the fight and as he had predicted earlier, the armour of the lizardman was not allowing it to attack Arnold while he was running around in circles, but not all was in favour of Arnold.

With each attack, the lizardman got closer and closer to him. It was only a matter of time before he would get struck down the battleaxe which could've put Arnold in a troublesome position.

And that wasn't all. The lizardman's armour was like a sword with a double edge. On one hand, it tremendously restricted the movement of the one wearing it and on the other hand, it was nothing less than an absolute defence against its enemies. After using his probe skill on the lizardman, Arnold knew that it was weak against fire-based attacks and explosions. Which was very fortunate for him.

Arnold could easily use both types of attacks by using the grenades and his elemental abilities to get rid of the lizardman, but using explosives in the swamps was completely out of the question, as an explosion might attract unnecessary attention from other monsters and if that happened, then the lizardman would have been the least of his concerns. He also didn't know whether there were other dragonkin in the swamps or not, and if there were more then Arnold certainly wouldn't have been able to defend himself in that situation.

So he decided to go for fire-based attacks instead. Without wasting a second, he immediately started firing fiery bullets at the lizard while circling around him.

___

You've dealt 654(+23) points of damage to your target.

Damage inflicted after damage reduction due to target's defence: 50 HP

Your bullets triggered the exclusive skill :

• [EXPLOSIVE SHOT]. Additional Damage dealt: 72 HP

• [LUCKY SHOT]. Additional true damage dealt: 39 HP

• [DOUBLE EDGE]. Damage dealt was multiplied by a factor of : 2

Total damage dealt: 178 HP

Target's remaining HP : 16822/17000

___

Unfortunately, even after triggering nearly all of the effects, he could by using the vindicators, the armour still successfully protected the lizard from most of the damage and only suffered minor burns on his back, which only brought down the lizard's HP by 178 points. Arnold then tried to use the [Arcane flames] at the lizard, hoping to deal continuous damage to the lizard but instead he got to know about the effect of [Dragon's disciple] ability - Damage reduction from fire-based attacks.

___

Creature's Passive ability, [Dragon's disciple] [stage one], is in effect now.

The creature gained 80% damage reduction from fire-based attacks for the next 60 seconds.

___

'Why stop at 80%? Go all out and make it 100% instead!'

Things were getting bad. Now, not only would the damage inflicted on the monster would get reduced by 80%, the remaining 20% of the damage would then get further reduced due to his armour's defence. Essentially, making the lizard immune to fire damage, something that should've been his weakness.

But Arnold wasn't going to give up so easily and then thought up a weird idea. He wanted to change the battlefield into something more favourable to him, like turning the swamp into his domain as he did during his fight against Jake, and then he could bombard the lizard with all types of grenades he had. Unfortunately, he wasn't allowed to use his domain in the way he wanted to.

___

You can only call out your domain in presence of other [Paladin] or [Vassal] or [God].

___

Although he was frustrated at this point he didn't show it. Finding a way to kill the lizard took the priority right now, rather than thinking about paladins, vassals or gods. He then tried to open up a portal beneath the lizard which would lead to his domain and then he could do the same thing as before, but instead he would do it inside the void. Easy right? Well, no. The system wasn't having that either.

___

The object/creature you're trying to store within the void is not associated with you in any way, shape or form. The process will be stopped now.

___

Arnold wasn't frustrated when the text appeared in front of his eyes, he was pissed. It was as if he was playing a game of chess with the system in his mind, where no matter what he did, the system always found a way to say 'check' to him.

Seeing that there was no other way to defeat the lizardman without the explosives, Arnold thought of a dangerous yet effective plan. He had been thinking about this for some time and it had been a while since he has wanted to put his plan into action, also he felt like this was the perfect opportunity to do so.

But before getting cocky, he quickly compared his stats to that of the lizardman.

___

HP : 10138/10138

MANA : 20037/20837

STRENGTH (STR) : 161[+65] (due to the gears)

DEFENSE (DEF) : 161 (due to the gears)

STAMINA (STA) : 78

INTELLIGENCE (INT) : 210

AGILITY (AGI) : 91

ACCURACY (ACC) : 94

EVADE (EVD) : 78

CHARISMA (CHA) : 86

MYSTIC (MYS) : 155

___

'Bruh... the fck am I even worried about?' A smile crept it's way to his face, 'The only field I'm lacking in is my HP... but it'll be fine until and unless I don't get hit by the lizard but then again, with the amount of defence I have getting hit once or twice wouldn't be an issue either.'

He then quietly stored the vindicator in his inventory and steeled himself to face the lizardman in hand to hand combat, but while he was at it a realisation dawned upon him. It was something he never thought before, but now he felt like he should've.

'If this lizard is a cosmic being while having much lower stats than mine, so does that means I too have achieved a cosmic rank as well?'

He wondered whether this 'sudden' progress was linked to his progress through the ascension quest or was it something that was happening with the other paladins as well? Maybe this was the reason how his weak and frail sister got so powerful all of a sudden and maybe, just maybe, she had already completed her ascension quest or some other equivalent of it? If that was the case then everything was clear now.

While Arnold was lost in his thoughts, the lizardman charged at him for the first time in their fight, roaring. His battleaxe in his hands, ready to slaughter his target.