Or stand on top of the ladder to his right with a bow and a hawkring equiped and just rain arrows on him.

How do I find this ladder?

That is a bit tricky. First you need to buy the key from Andre, then you have to go past the gate in Darkwood, past Alvina. If you continue on you'll find a huge door, that leads to the best boss in the game and possibly the entire franchise but you don't need to go there. Instead go trough the woods past the big mushroom people you''ll find a clearing [spoiler]with 2 huge ratdogbeast thingys[/spoiler] after the clearing is a bridge, past the bridge go left and voila...ladder. Honestly though, doing the Hydra is probably easier at low levels😜. Edit: Not entirly sure but I think you can YOLO past his right side and run to the ladder, but the water is deep at certain points and walking on those spots is an instakill.

That's even more ridiculous! I'm just gonna have to man up and chop him.

He is not really that bad, he is big and ugly so he might intimidate you but once you see trough that he is not that hard.

That's a recurring theme in the game IMO. I was really scared of the Bell Gargoyle at first because he's fast, strong, he flies and breaths fire. After a few attempts I realised that the fight is easy and predictable.