Hiragana: は to ん and the two marks

The second half of the grid

Five rows are left: は ひ ふ へ ほ, ま み む め も, や ゆ よ, ら り る れ ろ, わ を ん. Three of them are short. The や row has only three signs, the わ row keeps only わ and を, and ん stands alone as the single consonant that is a syllable by itself. Two readings are worth naming now: ふ is neither fu nor hu but a soft breath between them, and the ら row is a single light tap of the tongue, halfway between r and l.

Two marks that change the sound

Japanese does not invent new signs for voiced sounds: it adds two short strokes, the dakuten, to the top right of a kana. か becomes が, さ becomes ざ, た becomes だ, は becomes ば. The は row alone has a second mark, the small circle or handakuten, which turns は into ぱ. So one shape can carry three sounds: は, ば, ぱ.

みずのなかのさかなthe fish in the water

やまのうえのゆきthe snow on the mountain