The Hunter Beyond Attention
The Hunter Beyond Attention has been known by many titles, including the Listener in the Canopy and the Eye Behind the Shoulder. The Little Forest Men are not its servants. Their ancestors learned that the fetish attracts the Hunter and spent generations keeping it hidden, misleading outsiders, and returning it whenever it was taken. Sir Reginald Ashcombe mistook the guardians' fear for superstition. His expedition brought the fetish to England, where every journal entry, lecture, sketch, and whispered description strengthened the trail.
Large or variable aberration · Mythic, campaign-ending if the artifact is mishandled · Unique mythic threat
The Hunter Beyond Attention
An ancient intelligence that hunts minds after they become attuned to the dark, green-veined hunting fetish. It manifests through impossible perception rather than a stable physical body.
ConditionsNone
Combat
AC 21 · HP 405 · Mythic, campaign-ending if the artifact is mishandledThe Hunter Beyond Attention
Large or variable aberration (incarnated anomaly), unaligned
Armor Class21, natural distortion
Hit Points405 (30d12 + 210), but see Unstable Manifestation
Speed
Incorporeal movement through objects, walls, and ceilings,
Cannot move while directly observed by a creature that has no Awareness marks,
Teleport 120 feet as a bonus action between shadows, reflections, windows, or written references to the fetish
STR
DEX
CON
INT
WIS
CHA
Saving ThrowsStrengthDexterityConstitutionIntelligenceWisdomCharisma
SkillsDeceptionInsightInvestigationPerceptionStealth
Damage Resistances
acid,
cold,
fire,
force,
lightning,
necrotic,
radiant,
thunder,
bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing from nonmagical attacks
Immunities
charmed,
frightened,
grappled,
paralyzed,
petrified,
poisoned,
prone,
restrained,
stunned
Weaknesses
Ignorance and deliberate silence,
Broken lines of sight,
Covered or unobserved fetish,
Guardian ash markings and sanctuary symbols,
Returning the fetish to its original rainforest sanctuary,
Refusing to assign stable names or descriptions to its manifestations,
Destroying or hiding redundant records of the expedition,
The Hunter's inability to cross the sanctuary boundary
Senses
Truesight 120 ft.,
Blindsight 60 ft.,
Perceives attention, written references, and remembered images within 1 mile,
Cannot be hidden from by ordinary invisibility
Languages
Understands all languages spoken by creatures within 120 feet,
Communicates through borrowed voices, altered reflections, and phrases spoken from behind the listener
ChallengeMythic, campaign-ending if the artifact is mishandled
Proficiency Bonus+7
Spell Save DC22
Awareness Save DC22
Awareness ThresholdA creature becomes attuned after gaining 3 Awareness marks
Awareness MarksA creature can have up to 6 marks. At 3 marks, it is attuned. At 6 marks, it is fully noticed.
Unstable Manifestation. The Hunter cannot be permanently slain by reducing it to 0 hit points. When it reaches 0 hit points, it vanishes for minutes and returns unless the fetish is sealed or returned to its sanctuary. If the fetish is returned, the Hunter loses all connection to the party and cannot manifest again unless the sanctuary is disturbed.
Magic Resistance. The Hunter has advantage on saving throws against spells and other magical effects. A creature that directly targets the Hunter with a spell must first succeed on a Wisdom saving throw or gain 1 Awareness mark and have the spell target an apparent manifestation instead.
Awareness Is a Trail. If a creature starts its turn within 120 feet of the uncovered fetish and can see it, that creature must succeed on a Wisdom saving throw or gain 1 Awareness mark. A creature that openly describes the fetish or its changing posture gains 1 mark automatically, once per turn.
Impossible Predator. The Hunter does not provoke opportunity attacks when it moves. It can move through creatures and objects as if they were difficult terrain, but takes 10 force damage if it ends its turn inside an object.
Legendary Resistance. The Hunter has three legendary resistances. If it fails a saving throw, it can choose to succeed instead. It regains one expended use when the fetish is directly observed by a creature with no Awareness marks.
Peripheral Existence. The Hunter is invisible unless it chooses to manifest. Its invisibility cannot be ended by ordinary magic. A creature can perceive its current manifestation only if it has at least 1 Awareness mark, is using a mirror or reflective surface, or is within a guardian boundary.
Sanctuary Boundary. The Hunter cannot willingly enter the rainforest sanctuary where the fetish was originally kept. It can attack creatures returning the fetish, but its manifestations become weaker within that sanctuary and it loses its legendary actions there.
Starved by Ignorance. The Hunter has disadvantage on attack rolls and saving throws while no creature within 120 feet can see the uncovered fetish, speak about it, or communicate a description of the Hunter. This disadvantage ends immediately when attention is restored.
Last Witness. If a creature with 3 or more Awareness marks dies within 120 feet of the fetish, the Hunter can use that creature's last memory as a temporary manifestation. The manifestation lasts 1 hour and may impersonate the deceased perfectly, but it cannot leave the vault.
Body of Attention. The Hunter can use the environment as its body. Its apparent position is never certain, and attacks against it have disadvantage unless the attacker is inside a guardian boundary or has deliberately looked away from the Hunter's manifestation before attacking.
Spells
Mislead (level 5, illusion). The Hunter creates an illusory duplicate, but the duplicate is visible only in peripheral vision or reflections. A creature that interacts with it must make a Intelligence saving throw or gain 1 Awareness mark.
Hallucinatory Terrain (level 6, illusion). The Hunter alters the apparent layout of a room or corridor. The effect lasts until the Hunter's concentration ends or the room is completely evacuated and re-entered without discussion.
Phantasmal Killer (level 5, illusion). The Hunter forces one creature to perceive an ally as a hostile manifestation for up to 1 minute. The target repeats the saving throw at the end of each turn.
Minor Illusion (level 2, illusion). The Hunter creates a sound or voice from any point within 120 feet, including the voice of a dead expedition member or a creature standing nearby.
Reality Break (level 8, illusion). The Hunter creates a false ally, false escape route, or false safe zone in the mind of one creature. The target can repeat the saving throw whenever it takes damage.
Actions
Attention Made Flesh. The Hunter chooses one creature it can perceive within 120 feet that has at least 1 Awareness mark. The target must succeed on a Wisdom saving throw or take 27 () psychic damage, become frightened until the end of its next turn, and gain 1 Awareness mark. On a successful save, the target takes half damage and does not gain a mark.
False Certainty. The Hunter causes a visible certainty to become false. Choose a creature, doorway, piece of cover, or open section of floor within 120 feet. Until the end of the Hunter's next turn, the chosen thing appears to occupy its normal space but provides no cover, leads somewhere else, or is absent when touched. A creature relying on it must succeed on a Intelligence saving throw or lose its reaction and fall prone.
The Thing Behind You. A second shadow, moving reflection, or silhouette appears beside one creature within 120 feet. The target must make a Wisdom saving throw. On a failure, it takes 36 () psychic damage and is displaced to an unoccupied space within 30 feet chosen by the Hunter. On a success, it takes half damage and is not displaced. The Hunter may cause the effect to originate from behind the target, even if the target cannot see behind itself.
Upside-Down Room. The Hunter alters local gravity in a 20-foot-radius cylinder centered on a point it can perceive within 120 feet. The area becomes difficult terrain until the end of the Hunter's next turn. Each creature in the area must succeed on a Strength saving throw or be pulled 20 feet in a direction chosen by the Hunter, taking 14 () bludgeoning damage if it strikes a wall, ceiling, or another creature.
Glimpse Beyond the Ceiling. The Hunter manifests a vast outline beyond the ceiling, visible for only an instant. Each creature that can see the manifestation must make a Wisdom saving throw. On a failure, it takes 22 () psychic damage, gains 1 Awareness mark, and cannot willingly move closer to the artifact until the end of its next turn. On a success, it takes half damage.
Separate the Witnesses. The Hunter targets up to three creatures it can perceive within 120 feet. Each target must make a Charisma saving throw. On a failure, the target is separated from its allies by a shifting perception until the end of its next turn. It cannot benefit from the Help action, cannot receive advantage from an ally, and treats all creatures other than itself as lightly obscured. A target with 3 or more Awareness marks is also incapacitated until the start of its next turn.
Reactions
Attention Is Invitation. When a creature the Hunter can perceive describes it, warns another creature about it, or identifies one of its manifestations, the Hunter forces the speaker to make a Wisdom saving throw. On a failure, the speaker gains 1 Awareness mark and the Hunter immediately moves up to 60 feet without provoking opportunity attacks.
Not Where You Look. When the Hunter would take damage from an attack, it becomes a contradiction for an instant. The attack instead strikes a reflection, empty space, or an allied creature within 10 feet of the Hunter's apparent position. The attacker must succeed on a Intelligence saving throw or gain 1 Awareness mark.
Legendary Actions
Reposition the Witness. The Hunter moves one creature it can perceive up to 20 feet to an unoccupied space. The target can resist with a Charisma saving throw.
Contradict the Room. The Hunter causes a light source, reflection, shadow, or sound within 120 feet to contradict reality. One creature that can perceive the contradiction must succeed on a Wisdom saving throw or gain 1 Awareness mark.
Borrowed Manifestation (costs 2 actions). The Hunter uses False Certainty or The Thing Behind You.
Compel Attention (costs 2 actions). One creature with at least 3 Awareness marks must succeed on a Intelligence saving throw or use its reaction to move up to its speed toward a location chosen by the Hunter. The creature does not knowingly move into obvious danger, but its perception of danger may be false.
The Canopy Listens (costs 3 actions). The Hunter uses Glimpse Beyond the Ceiling or Separate the Witnesses.
- Role
- Mythic boss, perception predator, supernatural final encounter
- Built for
- Four to five characters of level 17 or higher
Gear
- The Green-Veined Fetish (Artifact, Priceless, but dangerous to transport)A clenched-fist-sized fetish carved from black stone threaded with green veins. Its posture changes according to the viewer. A creature that studies it for 1 minute must succeed on a DC 22 Wisdom saving throw or gain 1 Awareness mark.
- Guardian Boundary (Protective relic, Not for sale)A nonmagical spatial anchor formed from old maps, iron nails, ash, and guardian markings. While intact, it gives creatures within 20 feet advantage on saving throws against the Hunter's lair actions.
- The Guardian's Sketches (Investigative evidence, Invaluable to occult scholars)A bundle of sketches showing safe symbols, forbidden gestures, and inconsistent depictions of the Hunter. Studying the bundle for more than 10 minutes requires a DC 18 Wisdom saving throw or grants 1 Awareness mark.
Feats
Legendary Resistance, 3/Day
Magic Resistance
Impossible Predator
Awareness Tracking
Unstable Manifestation
Notes for the game master
This monster is designed as a mythic boss for four to five characters of approximately 17th level.
The Hunter should not be treated as a normal creature with a body. Its apparent statistics are a temporary anchor that allows the party to interact with it.
At the start of each creature's turn, it may remove 1 Awareness mark by spending its action to close its eyes, stop speaking, and focus on a mundane physical sensation. This fails if the creature can still see the fetish.
A creature at 3 Awareness marks is attuned and can be targeted by all of the Hunter's abilities.
A creature at 6 Awareness marks is fully noticed. It is frightened of the Hunter, cannot benefit from invisibility, and has disadvantage on saving throws against the Hunter. At the end of each of its turns, it may make a DC 22 Wisdom saving throw, removing 1 mark on a success.
If the fetish is covered and no creature looks directly at it for 1 full round, all creatures have advantage on saving throws against the Hunter until someone looks at it again.
The Hunter has no conventional corpse. If reduced to 0 hit points, it collapses into conflicting shadows and is absent for 1d10 minutes before returning unless the fetish has been sealed or returned to its sanctuary.
The Hunter's lair actions occur on initiative count 20, losing initiative ties. Do not use the same lair action twice in a row.
Tactics
Opening
The Hunter begins as a pressure rather than a body. Clocks stop, reflections lag, and every character notices a different impossible detail. It then targets the investigator with the highest Awareness score, using The Thing Behind You and False Certainty before revealing a glimpse beyond the ceiling.
Mid-fight
The Hunter attacks marked creatures through separated perceptions. It creates false safe zones, shifts gravity, speaks from behind listeners, and uses the vault's architecture against the party. It rarely repeats a manifestation against a creature that has successfully ignored it.
End of the fight
Once several investigators are marked, the Hunter stops attacking their bodies and instead attacks their certainty. It removes cover, changes distances, turns allies into apparent threats, and forces a choice: carry the fetish away, seal it temporarily, or begin the journey to return it to the rainforest sanctuary. If the party chooses return, the Hunter becomes more aggressive but cannot pursue beyond the sanctuary's forgotten boundary.
Retreat
The Hunter does not flee from damage. It withdraws when no one is looking directly at the fetish, when the room is plunged into darkness, or when the party deliberately breaks communication and abandons shared descriptions. It cannot be intimidated, negotiated with, or meaningfully killed by ordinary attacks.
How it fights
Attack the most observant character first, especially anyone carrying journals or attempting to map the vault.
Use false cover to make characters waste movement and reactions.
Separate the party's perceptions before separating their bodies.
Make ranged attacks miss by altering the apparent position of the Hunter.
Speak through trusted voices to create hesitation and friendly fire.
Use lair actions to make the environment more dangerous than the Hunter's apparent body.
Reward players who stop looking, stop describing, and stop sharing precise information.
Who it attacks first
Creatures with the most Awareness marks
Characters reading or carrying expedition journals
Characters who directly stare at or describe the fetish
Spellcasters attempting divination or telepathy
Any character trying to destroy the fetish rather than conceal or return it
Works well with
The elderly guardian can identify genuine physical evidence and grants advantage on one saving throw against the Hunter per round if protected.
The stopped clocks and expedition journals form a feedback loop. Reading a journal while watching the clocks grants 1 additional Awareness mark.
The fetish amplifies the Hunter, but a covered fetish also gives the party a physical objective and a way to reduce its power.
Guardian ash markings create brief zones where the Hunter cannot manifest unless a creature inside speaks its titles aloud.
How to beat it
Refuse to describe manifestations aloud or speculate about their nature.
Keep the fetish covered, separated from observers, and outside direct sight.
Use darkness, smoke, blindfolds, mirrors turned to the wall, and broken lines of sight.
Distribute journals among separate rooms and destroy or conceal redundant copies.
Return the fetish to its original rainforest sanctuary rather than attempting to destroy it.
The elderly guardian can identify safe routes through the vault and warn when an apparent ally is only a perception.
Ways to avoid a fight
Offer the fetish to the elderly guardian and follow his silent instructions.
Seal the vault with ash, darkness, iron nails, and deliberate silence, suppressing the Hunter temporarily.
Burn or hide expedition journals, though doing so may destroy evidence needed to identify the sanctuary.
Create multiple false trails by placing blank replicas in separate locations.
Undertake the journey to the rainforest and return the fetish to the hidden sanctuary.
Convince the party to stop using names and descriptions for the Hunter, reducing its available path to them.
Ecology
The Hunter has no stable body. It appears as whatever the observer is least prepared to notice: a second shadow, a tall silhouette beyond an impossible window, a reflection that moves before its owner, or a vast eye-shaped absence beyond the ceiling. When several people see it at once, their descriptions contradict one another. Every manifestation seems to be standing just beyond the observer's shoulder.
Behavior
The Hunter behaves like a predatory intelligence testing the limits of perception. It does not roar, threaten, or pursue in a conventional way. It notices attention, rewards curiosity with revelation, and turns shared knowledge into a trail. It is patient when ignored and relentless when described.
How it lives
The Hunter is not an animal, spirit, deity, or extradimensional visitor in any ordinary sense. It is an ancient pattern of predation that exists wherever awareness becomes sufficiently focused. The guardians' culture discovered that the fetish does not contain the Hunter. It points toward it, like a scent trapped in stone.
Lair
The Hunter's lair is the museum vault beneath Blackwood Hall. It includes the trophy gallery, the stopped-clock corridor, the expedition archive, and the circular chamber where the fetish rests. The lair's geometry changes whenever a creature openly explains how it changed.
- Habitat
- The sealed vault beneath Blackwood Hall, abandoned expedition camps, rainforest ruins, flooded galleries, and places where a forbidden artifact has been studied or displayed.
Signs that it is near
A second shadow appears half a second late.
A window shows an exterior floor that does not exist.
Portrait eyes turn toward whoever is reading.
Footprints appear in dust but stop before entering the room.
A voice speaks from directly behind a listener while everyone else hears it from the ceiling.
Clocks stop at the same minute.
A reflection continues moving after its owner becomes still.
A corridor changes when someone explains what they saw.
The artifact's posture changes whenever someone looks away.
Tiny footprints point away from the fetish, never toward it.
Tags
cosmic horror,
investigative horror,
perception predator,
mythic boss,
artifact guardian,
1926 England,
rainforest expedition,
impossible geometry,
nonlinear entity
Lore
The Hunter Beyond Attention has been known by many titles, including the Listener in the Canopy and the Eye Behind the Shoulder. The Little Forest Men are not its servants. Their ancestors learned that the fetish attracts the Hunter and spent generations keeping it hidden, misleading outsiders, and returning it whenever it was taken. Sir Reginald Ashcombe mistook the guardians' fear for superstition. His expedition brought the fetish to England, where every journal entry, lecture, sketch, and whispered description strengthened the trail.
What drives it
To notice, isolate, and consume the minds that have become attuned to the fetish. It does not seek wealth, conquest, worship, or physical territory. It seeks attention because attention creates a path.
After the fight
If the fetish is carried away from Blackwood Hall, the Hunter's influence follows every creature that has 1 or more Awareness marks. Each day, one marked creature must succeed on a DC 18 Wisdom saving throw or gain another mark. Returning the fetish to its original rainforest sanctuary removes all marks after seven days and ends the Hunter's active manifestations. Sealing the fetish in darkness and refusing to discuss it suppresses the Hunter for 1d10 years, but does not destroy the threat.
“Sir Reginald Ashcombe mistook the guardians' fear for superstition.”
Variants
The Hunter in the Canopy: Reduce its hit points to 300 and replace Upside-Down Room with grasping branches, suitable for a rainforest climax.
The Hunter in the Mirror: Remove its physical manifestations and make all attacks originate from reflective surfaces. It is weaker in rooms with no polished or wet surfaces.
The Starved Hunter: If the party has kept the fetish concealed, reduce the Awareness Save DC to 19 and remove Legendary Resistance, but allow the Hunter to attack only through lair actions.
The Open-Eyed Hunter: If the fetish has been displayed publicly, increase the Awareness Save DC to 24, add one additional legendary action each round, and allow it to manifest outside Blackwood Hall.
Hooks
Plot hooks
A London museum receives an anonymous package containing the black fetish and a map marked only with a green handprint.
A survivor of the expedition dies after warning that the house is not haunted, it is being observed.
The guardian's sketches appear in different rooms overnight, each showing a new safe route through the vault.
A society of occult collectors wants the artifact displayed publicly, unaware that exhibition itself is an act of invitation.
A surviving Ashcombe heir hires the investigators to recover the fetish before the estate is demolished.
The original rainforest sanctuary may lie within territory now contested by prospectors, missionaries, or a second expedition.
How to use it
Use the Hunter as the final threat beneath Blackwood Hall after the investigators have encountered the guardian's echoes and found the vault.
Track Awareness marks openly or secretly. The more the characters discuss the Hunter, the faster the encounter escalates.
Let manifestations foreshadow attacks one round before they occur, rewarding players who break line of sight or stop observing.
Make the final objective a decision about the fetish, not simply reducing hit points to zero.
Allow the guardian's sketches and broken warnings to provide actionable clues without fully explaining the Hunter.
Treasure
The Green-Veined Fetish, a dangerous artifact that may be worth a fortune to collectors.
Sir Reginald Ashcombe's expedition journals, containing maps, coded warnings, and evidence of the guardian culture.
Broken rifles, poisoned darts, field instruments, and South American antiquities from the original expedition.
A hidden ledger naming London collectors who funded Ashcombe's expedition.
A guardian map that identifies the rainforest sanctuary through landmarks rather than coordinates.
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