Graft thingy activation?

I cast spells and nothing happens. Fireballing.

It's supposed to spawn "pillars of ashen flame when you attack with this graft equipped" "creates 3 ashen pillars" and "cover enemies in ash on hit" and nothing at all happens.

Accidentally autoattacked with a misclick and the pillar thingies spawned.
We have to auto attack to get the effect? Asking because it was just a mistake to leave it on at all, typically have it off and move only in case of reflect.

Never mind lol, I have to get to my weekend. This is too unintuitive.