Well, it's been a long time since I posted a journal (or art), but I've been working hard anyway, just more on ideas than real art. I have mainly been working on Life After's universe, and I think I have a pretty good idea on what things will be like. In this journal, I'll give you a small overview of the inner workings of the Life after Universe!

Setting:
Well, Life After takes place in a world based on ours (of course) but even though it's called Earth, it's far from the same. The main city, Taren, is situated in the middle of a desert, the Soba Drifts. Taren is a rat hole of a city, crime infested, ruled by gangsters (the real kind, not the stupid idiots who call themselves gangs, I'm talking about Mafia), and 50 miles from anywhere. Think New York City in Las Vegas's place, only smaller and no casino's. Skyscrapers rise to the clouds and the whole city is a dull gray from the grimy slums to the Obsidian buildings of the Up Town, nothing is bright.
The Slums are where the drugs come and dreams die. If I called the whole city a rat hole, this is the toilet inside of it. If you're in the slums, you're either down on your luck, a cop, or a drug dealer. (Side Note: The Slums is where Lorenzo's Bar is located, Black's favorite place to gather information.)
The desert surrounding the city is far from a deserted wasteland, it's the hideout for the criminals who are wanted. Hunters call the desert "The Hunting Ground" and do their tracking and most of their fighting there.

Universe:
The Life After Universe consists of 4 Realms: Our(Human) Realm, Spirit Realm, Dark Realm, and Light Realm. Our Realm is self explanatory.
The Spirit Realm is basically Heaven and Hell. It's where the souls of all living things go after death and none can ever leave (except for some rear cases). Spells (see the People section) draw there magical power from here.  The only beings that are native to the Spirit Realm are the Xatanu. The Xatanu are the closest thing to immortal in all the realms. They can live beyond 500 years (the oldest has been said to have lived for 1385 years) and at the instant of death, a new Xatanu is born. They also have the ability to travel freely in between all realms to track down and retrieve spirits that have escaped or gotten lost. Although fearsome looking and unable to speak normally, the Xatanu are quite intelligent and can communicate telepathically to any creature and prefer to resolve a conflict with diplomacy rather than fight.
The Dark Realm is the domain of the Darklings. Nobody knows what it looks like or how things work there, in fact, humans don't even know of its existence.
The Light Realm is the opposite of the Dark Realm and the domain of the Vox. Again, humans have no idea that it even exists.

People:
There are 4 types of human in Life After: Normal Human's, The Faceless, Spells, and Autos. Normal Humans are just like anybody in our world, the can be white, black, Hispanic and so on, nothing special here. The Faceless are more interesting, from birth, they have no face below the eyebrows. They have eyes, a nose and a mouth, but you can see them for what some strange reason that science has yet to figure out. Most have fallen into the habit of wearing sunglasses to "fit in" better. Black is one of the Faceless.
Spells are a bit different, they are all but extinct. There is only a handful left and they keep to themselves, not demonstrating their amazing powers. Spells are (as their name suggests) spell casters and can use magic.
Autos are robots that look, think, and act like humans with only the smallest differences. Autos can be built for battle, office work or just to live their lives. Autos are treated as fellow humans among society and can make their own decisions and cannot be owned as property.

Organizations:
TRACE, Tactical Reconnaissance And Criminal Elimination. TRACE was created to counteract the outrageous crime rate in Taren City and is composed of three types of members: Hunters, Tracers, and Officers.
Hunters are all given Hunter Names (Black, Shad, Flames, ect.) and separate bank accounts from their real identities. With immunity to crimes committed while on the job, corruption runs rampant throughout Hunter ranks, and some consider them "glorified hitmen". There are some "pure" Hunters such as Black, but most have embraced the term and even refer to themselves as hitmen.  There are different levels of Hunters: Level 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, and 0. Level 5's are the new recruits, there is no training required to become a Hunter, so many get in over their head often and quit soon after. Level 1's are the best of the best. This is where Hunters like Flames and Bog are praised (Black is Level 2), Shad is also on the books as a Level 1. Level 0's are "Off the books" they are the hunters that nobody know about, and are only sent out to the highest bidders, usually overseas. (Shad is under both 1 and 0, but stays in country due to the fact that no other country will allow him within their borders).
Tracers are the information gatherers and "computer geeks" of the group. They handle the investigation of a target or the hacking of personal info. There are only a handful of Tracers, they need to be small in number because the hold the most important information of the group.
Officers are the Organization leaders and the people who hand out targets and assignments.

That's about it for now, I hope this has been an informative introduction to my universe.