Passing through the streets of Museford, you may find yourself distracted by chanting and shouts some way in the distance. Emerging from the winding streets towards the sound, you might have thought to find yourself in a different era. A large antiquated building looms over a square of open space. In the centre of the square stands a fountain, drawing your eye as a statue of a rejoicing man is propelled out of the base by some mechanism within the fountain. The water cascades down his smiling face along with numerous coins as he raises joyously upward and then is lowered back into the gushing water. A stream of bubbles, artfully placed, mark his little underwater home.

But this is incongruous with the groups of people gathered nearby, from whom you would have heard the chanting. They stand together clutching picket signs of varying sizes and bearing varying slogans decrying anything from the maintenance of public footpaths to the fact that the Museford Cheese Marketing Board has been bailed out for the 17th time this year. Around the shouting protestors, self-important people in suits thread into and out of the large building and try to avoid making eye contact.

This is Protest Plaza, the Fountain of Joy, and the Museford Town Hall. Most political activity has its roots here, both civilian and governmental, with most protests taking place in the aptly named Protest Plaza and most politics taking place in the Town Hall, the large old building at the far end of Protest Plaza. The Plaza itself has a single decoration, the Fountain of Joy. No one knows who commissioned it or why, many consider it wildly inappropriate in themes to have in the square, but the man who rises out of the water is called Balthasar. This was underlined several times on the planning permission. Tourists and citizens alike throw coins to Balthasar, believing that with sacrifices to him, they too can achieve the same joy and contentment that he appears to be exhibiting.

Within the town hall itself can be found most of Museford's government. The mayor's office, occupied by Mayor Christopher Politick, takes pride of place, with countless other boardrooms and places of record and bureaucracy scattered like a maze through the large yet somehow claustrophobic old building. Also in this maze of rooms is the People for the Safety of Your relatives and Caution of Humanity projecting Ethereally (or PSYCHE, as they desperately wished to be known), the bureau dealing with the city's psychics and psychic issues.

Mayor Christopher Politick (he/they): Famously affable, famously inconsistent, Mayor Christopher has skated by in politics by his ability to promise all sides what they want and just barely reconcile a compromise.

Amanda Lee (she/her): The head of PSYCHE, she took the job from the last person who was fired after creating the acronym. Famously studious and fascinated with psychic powers, she is rarely seen outside the office.

Storm S.Langford (any): The receptionist for the building, but is often caught wandering the corridors trying to be “helpful” elsewhere. Don't ask her about her theories about birds.