It's a fantasy role-playing game.

DM: You are Vex Vex'ahlia, a half-elf ranger . You are the member of the famous group of adventurers. Previously, Scanlan offers to leave his employee, Chod, with Tary, who will be returning to his family home and needs people for his brigade. Keyleth opens a tree portal to bring them all back to Whitestone.
DM: Okay. You make your way down there, and you can see it's still fairly dark in that chamber. Most of the lights have been snuffed except for a few torches that are set around the central platform that was built about mid-height on the ziggurat, where you guys had the council meeting with Raishan that one time, and where most of the research is being done there. Up top, you see a number of guards, the Pale Guard are assigned to keep watch. You see Jecht, the manservant of the Realmseer Eskil there, as well. Currently, you see Eskil Ryndarien is spreading out his thick scrolls and books, and they're all across the big central wooden table, and he has his thick spectacles on, and he has a number of candles already set up, and he's deep into getting his space prepped and acquiring whatever information he'd put away since the investigation was put on hold.
Player: Eskil?
DM: "Yes? Oh, it has been some time, Lady Vex'ahlia. I've heard you've come up in the world."
Player: Oh, yes. I'm a lady now.
DM: "Wondrous. Yes. What do I have the honor?"
Player: Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I'm afraid being down here isn't safe anymore.
DM: "Right, so you brought me all the way out here, and now I can't do my work? That's great. No, that's par for the course. It's basically most of my life."
Player: Plenty of work up top, away from this orb of death. It's very dangerous.
DM: "Oh! You're right. I didn't know that. I've only spent six months with the thing!"
Player: We've discovered it's a gateway, and things can come through it, and there might be armies coming through because we just fought somebody on the other side of another ziggurat.
DM: "That's preposterous. Siphons only work one way, my dear. Nothing's coming through there."
Player: She changed it. Did you know that siphons can be changed? It changed from one color to another.
DM: "You know this how?"
Player: Because I was there to witness it.
DM: "What, here?"
Player: In Ank'harel. And it looks the exact same as this one.
DM: He looks you over really intensely. "If what you believe you saw is indeed another one of these siphons, then perhaps we should take a little more care."
Player: I agree.
DM: "Jecht, please continue. Gather everything. We're taking this outside."
Player: Fabulous. You're so agreeable. I do love talking to you.
DM: "Wonderful. Good to know. Goodbye." They gather up the materials. The Pale Guard escorts them back into the hallway, and he's now talking to Jecht off on the side. He goes, "Well, then we can go ahead and stage ourselves in the grand guestroom with the nice big bed. Yes?"
Player: The big ornate bed.
DM: He looks over his shoulder as you say this. "Oh, you're eavesdropping now, as well. That's wondrous."
Player: I have wonderful hearing.
DM: "So I can tell. Yes, the big bed. The one that helps with my back."
Player: Yes, that's terrible. Can you look at this armor really fast and make sure that it's not actually cursed or anything?
DM: "Looks fine to me!" Keeps walking.
