Shadow Eft

A shadow eft appears as a large demonic humanoid, without features except for fused bone and solidified shadow.

Shadow efts cannot speak, though they understand a variety of languages, including Abyssal, Common, and Celestial.

A shadow eft stands 8 feet tall and weighs about 300 pounds.

A shadow eft prefers to strike from hiding, readying itself with offensive psionic powers, then charging forward using its psionic lion’s charge.

Psi-Like Abilities: 3/day⁠—​duodimensional claw, psionic lion’s charge, truevenom (ML 7th) 1/day⁠—​shadow body (ML 15th). The manifester level (ML) for these powers is 6th unless otherwise noted.

Venom of the Mind (Ex): Whenever a shadow eft uses its truevenom psi-like ability, it heals 5 hit points by psychic transference for each 1 point of Constitution damage dealt to its victim, no matter the shadow eft’s spatial or planar separation from the victim.

Aversion to Daylight (Ex): Shadow efts are creatures of the night and loathe light. If exposed to natural daylight (not merely a daylight spell), they take a −4 penalty on all attack rolls, saving throws, and skill checks.

Hide in Shadow (Su): A shadow eft can use the Hide skill even while being observed. As long as it is within 10 feet of some sort of shadow, a shadow eft can hide itself in the open without having anything to actually hide behind. It cannot, however, hide in its own shadow.

Skills: A shadow eft has a +8 racial bonus to Hide when hiding in shadows.

Shadow efts are a race of psionic monsters that normally dwell between worlds (on the Plane of Shadow), subsisting on psychic residue. Sometimes, traumatic events cause emotions so intense that shadow efts are drawn through conduits of darkness, where they are able to prey directly upon sentient minds. Their population on material worlds swells on the darkest night of the year, the winter solstice when the night has her greatest dominion over all the earths. When they find their way onto the Material Plane (if not psionically called), they prefer dreary, shadowy, cold forests.

Characters with ranks in Knowledge (psionics) or Knowledge (the planes) can learn more about shadow efts. When a character makes a skill check, the following lore is revealed, including information from lower DCs.

Shadow efts see themselves as individuals who have found the perfect niche in which to hunt for easily obtained mental energy. They know their predations harm sentient creatures, but they feel that it is the natural order. Though they sometimes cooperate, they are more apt to see other shadow efts as potential competitors.

Shadow efts exist in a loose confederacy, with each eft a power unto itself. They all believe that the “Unmerciful Void” (their personification of the sum of all shadow and darkness everywhere) somehow watches over for them and provides them with the opportunities they need to find sustenance.

Called shadow efts do not possess treasure. Shadow efts encountered naturally possess normal treasure values for their Challenge Rating.

A typical shadow eft, when encountered naturally, carries three potions in slender bone-carved vials: displacement, cure serious wounds, and protection from arrows.