Feeling like it was an opportune moment, Lizard lunged for the attack. 

 

His plan was to go for a big swing, and since Saiph is unarmed, he’ll try dodging. But once he does, Lizard planned to surprise him with an attack from his tail, which will surely kill this feeble bodied enemy.

 

Saiph on the other hand, seeing Lizard running at him, he still was in a daze, but his mind started to act instinctively.

 

Seeing the sword coming, he dodged it the best he could, but his body was aching too much from the previous exertion.

 

Once he dodged, a tail popped out from behind Lizard. It was too close for Saiph to dodge it. 

 

He used his overtaxed right arm to attempt pushing the tail away from attacking a vital area, and to his luck, he succeeded.

 

He came out with only a graze on the left of his chest and then rolled away.

 

Leaning on a nearby wall, Saiph managed to stand up strugglingly while staring at the tailed steward.

 

That last exchange made him come back to his senses, though not at his best. 

The tailed Steward was upset, he was close to killing Saiph but the chance slipped out of his hands. 

 

Looking at Saiph’s appearance, it seems he won't be able to fight for much longer, which gave Lizard confidence and made him bolder in his actions. He kept up the pressure to quickly end the fight.

 

Saiph used his right arm to push himself and maneuver away from the tailed steward. The majority of his limbs, which reached proficiency of 50%, could not keep up with the exhaustion of overexertion, but his right arm, although having a stronger overdraft state, could last longer in that state. It seems proficiency also affects stamina and energy consumption.

 

The stewards have been trained in martial arts and eat well, so even if they don't use their Mygans, Saiph would not normally last for long against them.

 

After a few missed attacks, Saiph was able to reach the floating head's location, he wanted to get the knife that he used to cut off the monster’s ear. 

 

As he had hoped, he was able to grab it. 

 

The tailed steward stopped in his tracks, he was frustrated that he could not kill this rodent when he had so many chances. But what surprised him the most was that he was able to dodge his sword attacks and the ones from his tail. granted, his control over the tail is a bit stiff, but he practiced a few moves like the surprise attack he first used against Saiph.

 

But now, his tail has become tired, it’s why he would have preferred to use his hands and feet instead. The reason is that foreign Mygans to the host anatomy, like a tail to humans, recover slower than if they were in the original host, an actual lizard in the case of the Green Lizard Tail Mygan. Although, getting more proficient at the Mygan can counteract this issue.

 

At this moment, both men stared at each other, one panting much more than the other.

 

The steward hoped the injury from before would make Saiph bleed enough for an easy win, which is now why he's being patient and waiting it out while making sure Saiph doesn't escape. If the Azfar family found out he could not kill a villager and let him escape, there is a chance they may just kill him. He did not dare to run off with the loot here like he told Saiph, the Azfar family would easily hunt him down, they possess ways to track all the people they employ. But what he was planning on taking were the things on the other stewards, things like money and weapons, the family would usually turn a blind eye to these types of actions.

On the other side, Saiph was an arrow at the end of its journey,  he felt that there was not much he could do anymore, he used up all he had.

 

He felt that if he waited, he was sure to meet his fate, and if he tried to rush an attack, he would surely fail. 

 

So what could he do? If he can't run and fight head-on? 

Looking at his knife, he thought of a dangerous idea. What if he threw the knife? This would be his last-ditch effort, for his survival. As for the emotional repercussions of killing the tailed steward, in his current emotional state, he has already become an emotionless machine that has only one goal, survive!

 

But, before doing that, he decided to use the points he got from killing Bear, which was around 6 points when he checked it while standing over the body. He planned to put all of it into his right arm since the next action he takes is the deciding factor for whether he lives or dies.

"Put all my points into my right arm!"

He did not have time to close his eyes to check his changed statistics. However, Saiph definitely could feel the control over his arm improve slightly. In fact, he had a hunch that if he went slightly further, there would be a reward waiting for him. 

Lizard saw that Saiph had a resolute face, which he assumed to mean that Saiph is planning on a final confrontation. He was fine with this, his sword was longer so Saiph would lose in the face to face confrontation. In his experience, it was best for Saiph to move around and try to attack while moving, but that was a lot harder in the corridor of this cave. Nonetheless, Lizard still had to be careful of the Saiph kamikaze attack. 

 

At this moment Saiph pounced forward and Lizard began preparing to swing his sword before Saiph could get in range to use his short knife. But that's when Lizard saw Saiph start to maneuver his body to throw his knife. Lizard started to move his body to the side in order to make it harder for himself to be hit. On the other side, Saiph wanted the knife to hit a fatal spot, which is why he aimed at the head.

 

Throwing knives is a skill on its own, which is why, normally, if any amateur tried to do this, they would fail to harm Lizard. Saiph doesn't have much fighting experience to understand the difficulty of the attempt he is trying to accomplish. However, he is aware that he is likely to fail at something new he never tried before, but he did not see any other option for survival.

 

All he was banking on, was that the near-perfect control, the close distance, and the overdraft of his right arm would make up for this. 

 

Saiph threw the knife with all he had left, and luckily for him, he threw it at enough great speed and close distance, that the tailed steward’s attempt to maneuver, did not succeed. The knife plunged into Lizard's face, left of his nose.

 

Lizard fell to the ground holding on to his face, but it did not take much time before he stopped flailing his body and passed away. 

 

Saiph also fell on the floor panting once he saw the man get hit by the knife, he did it. Saiph did not know how lucky he was but was sure it was an unlikely outcome that he be the last man standing in that situation.

But Saiph knew that it would be best if he could avoid such risky bets going forward. 

But in this battle, he did not feel he had much of an option, it was either to die slowly or to take a chance at survival.