The Borderland Queendom of Karistina is a gargantuan, safe nation, ruled by Karistina Rajem with an even hand, and notable for its ban on automobiles, smutty television, and punitive income tax rates. The compassionate, democratic, cheerful population of 30.539 billion Karistinans are fiercely patriotic and enjoy great social equality; they tend to view other, more capitalist countries as somewhat immoral and corrupt.

The government — a sprawling, bureaucracy-choked, socially-minded morass — is primarily concerned with Environment, although Education, Healthcare, and Public Transport are also considered important, while Industry and Spirituality are ignored. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Rajem. The income tax rate is 100%.

The large but stagnant Karistinan economy, worth 559 trillion marks a year, is extremely specialized and mostly made up of the Tourism industry, with major contributions from Book Publishing. State-owned companies are reasonably common. Average income is 18,327 marks, and distributed extremely evenly, with practically no difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Exorbitant spending on icebreakers breaks the ice at every budget meeting, passionate nomination battles are often as intense as general elections, religious organizations are being forced to leave the country or pay income taxes like everybody else, and community-designed sword prostheses are becoming dangerously common. Crime is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Karistina's national animal is the falcon, which soars majestically through the nation's famously clear skies.

Karistina is ranked 96,708^th in the world and 2^nd in The Wheel of Time for Most Advanced Law Enforcement, scoring 983.95 on the Orwell Orderliness Index.