"We're not actually in one.  It's just a metaphor that you can understand without putting on the artifact headband.  Or to the extent you could say we're inside one, it's because the idiom of the novel-game is one that's repeated in many different forms across many worlds Nethys can get information about, which is part of why Nethys guesses it might be a good fit for something that's happening on some higher realm of existence."

"We're not actually in one.  It's just a metaphor that you can understand without putting on the artifact headband.  Or to the extent you could say we're inside one, it's because the idiom of the novel-game is one that's repeated in many different forms across many worlds Nethys can get information about, which is part of why Nethys guesses it might be a good fit for something that's happening around and above us."