It's been a couple weeks since Black Iron & Cinder ended, and I'm sure some of you are waiting for news on the two upcoming projects I made mention of. I'm happy to say that it's now the time to go into them. But first, I also want to go over my plans for BI&C, specifically what I'll be doing with it now that it's complete.

I still fully intend on putting BI&C up for sale, almost certainly on Amazon for Kindle and paperback. Before all of that, however, I'll be going back and doing one more edit of the story, to hopefully fix any and all grammatical and spelling errors and change and add some dialogue and details. I won't do any major plot restructuring or similar monumental tasks. How long will this take? Well, I don't want to take any attention away from my other two projects, but I don't want to fiddle around and waste time, either. Let's give myself a generous window of one to two months. By then, the new edit should hopefully be complete and the book will be up for sale for you all to read on your devices or even on good old paper.

Now, what are the next two projects I've been mentioning so much? The first one is something very, extremely different from Black Iron & Cinder, if only because I wish to try my hand at a different setting.

The title is The Wolf of Asano. It's not fantasy. In fact, it's set in the very real city of Los Angeles, but a fictionalized version of it where Asian gangs (Japanese, Korean, Chinese) have a major foothold in large parts of the city. The story takes place in the somewhat near-future of 2039, where almost every vehicle on the road is a self-driving taxi, sophisticated cybernetics require an interface to be installed in your brain stem, and life-like androids initially made for labor on the Mars colonies are available for consumer purchase (though for an extremely pretty penny). The plot isn't some hardcore militaristic sci-fi action thriller, but a mystery where a Japanese-American yakuza by the name of Atreus Watanabe -- member of the feared clan called the Sanada-gumi -- is tasked with solving the murder of an employee of the nation's leader in cybernetic technology, because it unfortunately took place within Sanada-gumi territory, and no one knows why.

So, yes, it's extremely different from Black Iron & Cinder, as I said. If you're not into this kind of thing, I won't hold it against you. Admittedly, despite how I described it, it doesn't lean into the futuristic stuff as much as the mystery itself, which may be good or bad depending on your expectations. To be honest, I don't know if it's sci-fi enough to even be suitable for RoyalRoad, but I'll bring it here anyway. This setting is uncharted territory for me, so I can't guarantee it'll be better than BI&C overall, but I hope you'll stick with me regardless.

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My second project is what some (or most) of you, as BI&C readers, have likely been hoping for, and I knew you'd want it so I went ahead and started planning stuff out somewhat early on.

The title is Born From the Storm. It takes place years after Black Iron & Cinder, and on the southern continent of Drangvus, which was mentioned in passing once or twice (sorry to anyone who hoped for it to be set in Threcia. Maybe some other time). When an eerie, unexpected storm strikes the seaside town of Adolport, the young King Josyph Garland III of the capital city of Alum Corva begins a hasty relief mission to help the town rebuild, as its bustling fishing and transportation businesses are key contributors to the kingdom's economy. On his behalf, King Josyph sends the somewhat easygoing Rowan Pike -- the king's "Right Hand" -- to oversee the mission. Once there, Rowan discovers the terrible extent of the damage caused by the storm, and must take the reins of restoring order. However, as the days pass, a strange sickness that causes indescribable nightmares and unquenchable thirst begins to spread through the town like a plague. Rowan and some of the relief volunteers take it upon themselves to investigate the matter, going so far as to assume that perhaps it was the storm itself that was the cause of it.

Sufficiently eerie, yes? I'd like to continue -- for now, at least -- the motif of dark/horror fantasy for this series, which honestly doesn't really have a name right now. While BI&C was a sort of zombie apocalypse-inspired horror, I want to lean into Lovecraftian horror for Born From the Storm.

There you have it, folks: a more detailed look of my upcoming fictions. The Wolf of Asano will be beginning here on RoyalRoad in the near future, before BI&C's Amazon launch, so please keep your eyes peeled for it. I can't give a window for Born From the Storm yet, because I still have a lot of work on it ahead of me, but I'm feeling pretty confident with what I've done so far.

That's all for my update! Once again, keep an eye out for The Wolf of Asano and another update after that in which BI&C will be available for purchase!