“Here’s a thought,” you say. “You can get the illusion to follow me; but can you also get it to stay still? If we turn it into something they feel they need to deal with, that might distract them while I get the box in place.”
The problem with that is, they’re not reacting to the illusion, they’re reacting to the ether… but I might be able to set up the illusion so the ether keeps going in and out of the circle. Let’s see what that does. Tell me when they stop paying attention.
A few moments of observation later, there’s an illusion bobbing back and forth in the circle. Every few seconds, the creatures stop to look at it. You start moving the box, slowly advancing when their attention is on the illusion. It takes a while, but you soon get close to the location.
Just as another creature pops out of it. And it notices you before it spots the illusion.
The creature makes a strange noise, and suddenly all the others are looking at you too.
Slice it quickly with your sword to gather goop, jump backwards handflip and draw a circle around you, all in one acrobatic maneuver
Kick the box into it to distract it temporary while you run away
Stay still, tell the wizard to cast strong winds and fireballs to buy you a bit of time
I meant to type “do a backwards handflip” – spin with one hand as you do so, so you both draw the circle + get away + look cool as hell