[[File:AstralGlyphs-GalaxyQueen.png|thumb|right|300px|"[[Number 83: Galaxy Queen]] ([[DARK]])" written in Astral (top) and Japanese (bottom).]]

In reality, the glyphs are a [[wikipedia:Substitution cipher|cipher]] of Japanese. With the exception of numbers and a few special characters, each glyph is a stylized version of a [[wikipedia:katakana|katakana]]. A word written in Japanese phonology can be converted to Astral glyphs, by converting each syllable of the word to its katakana and then replacing each katakana with its corresponding Astral glyph. The long vowel marker, "ー", is replaced with the vowel it is prolonging.