With Johto Mono, you can add a touch of retro cool to your Japanese text with the katakana syllabary. In the Japanese writing system, the katakana syllabary (/katakana/) is used primarily for transcription of foreign words into Japanese and the writing of loan words (collectively gairaigo), as well as to represent onomatopoeia and scientific names. The katakana syllabary consists of 48 syllables, not counting obsolete and scientific uses. Each character represents one sound, but since several sounds are represented by the same character, reading katakana can sometimes be ambiguous. The katakana syllabary is a set of 48 small, square shapes.