Surprisingly, the danger following his failed magical assault had not come from the enemies charging him within reach of their weapons, thus rendering the octopus' precaution useless, but from their own steadier hands - or paws? - in striking from afar. As the ratfolk's dagger bit into his left shoulder, steel gnawing at the cycle of the red ichor in which were stored his forces, a hollow gurgling sound escaped Ulor's throat, and his fingers painfully clutched the crystal in an agonising vice. His will was surrounded by the fiery tide of taloned crimson pain, the tips of its flames rising in claws to break the mystical grip of his enchantments. But the strength issuing from the dark, unsoundable well which the eyeless gaze of that which was beyond had carved within him was not to be overwhelmed. A pillar of spiral-woven resolve arose towering from it, shattering the flaming torrent and reaffirming his shadowy grip on the goliath's vigour. With something resembling a snarl, Ulor tore the dagger out of his flesh, bloody force dripping from the wound it left behind, and stretched the hand holding it out towards the octopus. The latter, forewarned by a mental nudge, briefly looked down with surprise, but, evidently not thinking it worth to argue over something of this sort at the moment, grasped up the weapon in a pair of tentacles.

All of this had not occupied more than a few instants. The tormentous grip of metal still pulsed in his shoulder, which was growing warm with spilled strength, but this was no longer the most pressing threat. The masked foe had drawn forth an incantation of his own, and conjured an eidolon directly before Ulor, though, oddly, apparently not with the intent of clashing with him directly. Over the blows being traded by the warriors further down the street, he heard the primalist call out to the rest of the group to focus their efforts on the mage rather than his creation, an exhortation which seemed perfectly reasonable. After all, the withered creature was likely directing the eikon and fueling its unnatural existence with its spells, and, if that was indeed the case, disrupting the evocation would shatter them.

Raising his right hand, fingers twisted as gnarled, knobbly vines, Ulor began to whisper in hideously disjoined and discordant tones. [i]"N’gai, n’gha’ghaa, vahr-shoggog, y’hah..."[/i] The dread words from alien infinities streamed out, jagged and malformed, from a mouth not made to utter their kin; like the flight of a silent winding brook through an impossible horizontal precipice, inaudible to all but their target. Once they reached the veiled brigand, his mind would be wracked with a terror issuing from the cold stars of a distant void, a fear few, in Ulor's experience, could withstand unshaken.

Meanwhile, the octopus, which, along with the dagger, had received a fairly vague hint as to how it could further its master's latest plan, moved forth. Propelling itself with its swimming motions all while holding the dagger, it floated over his head, then deftly passed around the doppelganger and continued its airborne advance. Having finished his spell, Ulor returned his attention to the familiar, and once more his inward mouth spoke to its web of thought. What the octopus heard left even it, accustomed as it was to the summoner's oddities, baffled for a moment; but then, once again, it could think of no objection to offer to this new scheme.

Onwards it flew, weaving over the soil in a manner which would no doubt astonish its aquatic kin. Over the dirt and the ice, and near that Tal-ionis, was it, fellow who, Ulor knew from past experience, could at least be relied upon to crush miscreants with his hammer. Once it was sufficiently close to both the paladin and his savage adversary, it began to even further defy the nature of the form it had coalesced into, weaving, sweeping and wildly swinging the dagger in the goliath's general direction. While it was unlikely to land even the most meagre of strikes on a capable fighter, the sight of a dagger-wielding octopus in itself was as fine a distraction as anyone could hope for, and even the nuisance of a blindly slashing blade was not to be so lightly dismissed.


[hider=Mechanics]

Ulor succeeds in maintaining concentration on his [i]Hex[/i] after being wounded, and, removing the dagger from his shoulder, hands it to the Octopus.

Saving throw for concentration: [url=https://www.roleplayerguild.com/rolls/2837]17[/url]

He then casts [i]Dissonant Whispers[/i] on the Drifter (2 Level 2 spell slots spent, 0 remaining).

Dissonant Whispers damage roll: [url=https://www.roleplayerguild.com/rolls/2839]11[/url]

The Octopus flies over Ulor, diagonally around the Drifter's copy, then 15 feet forward, stopping once adjacent to both Lex and the goliath. It then begins to distractingly feint at the latter, [i]helping[/i] Lex in his next attack against the thug leader.

[/hider]

[@JBRam2002] The human is up next.