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Description
The Sussurus is a bizarre plant-like creature that haunts dark woods, graveyards and dungeons. While its appearance is quite frightening, its strange abilities have caught the attention of many warriors and mage hunters. One of its most notable abilities is its "dronesong." The many holes that perforate its body use the wind and air to create an eerie sound that is embedded with endless babbling of nonsense. This droning sound affects all undead, as its hidden commands override all previous thoughts and programming. Instead it floods the brain (or control organ) with hundreds of different commands, many of them ridiculous or contradictory, leaving the undead beast a twitching frozen mess as it tries to obey the thousands of voices in its head. This ability has made the Sussurus a preferred pet or companion for those who wish to fight the undead or the hordes of a necromancer. Its mere presence can render these monsters useless, allowing warriors to cut them down with ease. It has also made the Sussurus wildly popular for graveyard owners and groundskeepers, as it makes it difficult for necromancers and other undead creatures to intrude and disturb their property. This is why one of the Sussurus' biggest habitats is graveyards and crypts, as owners transplant them to these properties to prevent their customers from rising out of the ground and shambling off.

Another strange ability the Sussurus possess is its intrusive "shouts." By gathering air in its hollow core, it can release a bellow that is strong enough to knock soldiers off their feet. This concussive force, however, is not what makes such a move dangerous. This "shout" may sound like nonsense (much like the dronesong) but such a noise actually contains words buried beneath the cacophony. Whenever a Sussurus releases a "shout," it can scream out certain words and phrases at extreme volumes. While this may seem like a silly thing compared to a powerful gust of wind, it is absolutely devastating when your magic relies solely on words and phrases. The "shout" of a Sussurus is actual loud and intrusive enough that it can interrupt spells and summonings. When a magical opponent begins to chant a phrase to unleash a powerful spell, the Sussurus will "shout" mid-chant and screw up the entire process. Most of the time, these interjections make the spells useless, and they fizzle out into pathetic sparks. With that, the mage is disarmed and also robbed of the mana they wasted for the ruined spell. Most of the time, the Sussurus will "shout" nonsense in order to screw up the spells, but some craftier creatures can actually interject new words or phrases into the spells to alter them. For example, if some mage goes to use a spell that translates to "cloak myself in shadow," the Sussurus can hijack the spell with a "shout" and change it to "cloak myself in shrews." With this, magic users must be careful when casting lengthy spells around a Sussurus, as it can easily change them up for the worst. These "shouts" have been so effective, that they have wiped out the use of a certain, popular spell that was all the rage many years ago. Translating to "Immolate my enemies," the spell was easily changed through a "shout" to create the phrase "Immolate my self."

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Based upon the Dungeons and Dragons monster, as well as an update for a very old drawing I did a long time ago. I did alter some of the abilities of the official DnD Sussurus, but it was all in good fun.

Description
The Sussurus is a bizarre plant-like creature that haunts dark woods, graveyards and dungeons. While its appearance is quite frightening, its strange abilities have caught the attention of many warriors and mage hunters. One of its most notable abilities is its "dronesong." The many holes that perforate its body use the wind and air to create an eerie sound that is embedded with endless babbling of nonsense. This droning sound affects all undead, as its hidden commands override all previous thoughts and programming. Instead it floods the brain (or control organ) with hundreds of different commands, many of them ridiculous or contradictory, leaving the undead beast a twitching frozen mess as it tries to obey the thousands of voices in its head. This ability has made the Sussurus a preferred pet or companion for those who wish to fight the undead or the hordes of a necromancer. Its mere presence can render these monsters useless, allowing warriors to cut them down with ease. It has also made the Sussurus wildly popular for graveyard owners and groundskeepers, as it makes it difficult for necromancers and other undead creatures to intrude and disturb their property. This is why one of the Sussurus' biggest habitats is graveyards and crypts, as owners transplant them to these properties to prevent their customers from rising out of the ground and shambling off.

Another strange ability the Sussurus possess is its intrusive "shouts." By gathering air in its hollow core, it can release a bellow that is strong enough to knock soldiers off their feet. This concussive force, however, is not what makes such a move dangerous. This "shout" may sound like nonsense (much like the dronesong) but such a noise actually contains words buried beneath the cacophony. Whenever a Sussurus releases a "shout," it can scream out certain words and phrases at extreme volumes. While this may seem like a silly thing compared to a powerful gust of wind, it is absolutely devastating when your magic relies solely on words and phrases. The "shout" of a Sussurus is actual loud and intrusive enough that it can interrupt spells and summonings. When a magical opponent begins to chant a phrase to unleash a powerful spell, the Sussurus will "shout" mid-chant and screw up the entire process. Most of the time, these interjections make the spells useless, and they fizzle out into pathetic sparks. With that, the mage is disarmed and also robbed of the mana they wasted for the ruined spell. Most of the time, the Sussurus will "shout" nonsense in order to screw up the spells, but some craftier creatures can actually interject new words or phrases into the spells to alter them. For example, if some mage goes to use a spell that translates to "cloak myself in shadow," the Sussurus can hijack the spell with a "shout" and change it to "cloak myself in shrews." With this, magic users must be careful when casting lengthy spells around a Sussurus, as it can easily change them up for the worst. These "shouts" have been so effective, that they have wiped out the use of a certain, popular spell that was all the rage many years ago. Translating to "Immolate my enemies," the spell was easily changed through a "shout" to create the phrase "Immolate my self."

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Based upon the Dungeons and Dragons monster, as well as an update for a very old drawing I did a long time ago. I did alter some of the abilities of the official DnD Sussurus, but it was all in good fun.