Aklo (AHH - kloe)

Aklo is a pre-human occult language, common to many primeval and unearthly species. Ancient races, Dark Fey, and entities from the Void are the most common speakers of Aklo. It is no one's native tongue but rather a sort of lingua franca, spoken by many beings as a way to communicate across cultures. Aklo endures through time, rarely evolving, and so speakers of the tongue can always communicate at least mostly accurately. Regarding certain concepts, Aklo is superior to other tongues: a member of an ancient race might share a common language with a younger creature, but still choose to use Aklo to communicate important arcane concepts correctly and with precision.
Aklo is not fully usable by or comprehensible to mortals, as its concepts and grammar are not compatible with a sane mind. Many parts of the Aklo language also function on a different level than mere vocal communication. Spoken Aklo contains an empathic component best conveyed through telepathy, which resonates within the written form as well.
The tenses of Aklo are not simply past, present, and future, but rather change like the fluid shifting of other realities and dimensions unreachable by mortals. Aklo is the language best suited to entities that perceive the passage of time differently from mortals: as a collection of simultaneous or nearly coterminous events rather than as a stream. Creatures that have undergone profound changes in their forms and minds (such as liches or other ancient, sentient undead) can also make good use of Aklo.
Not all speakers comprehend Aklo at the same level. Some have access only to the fundamental principles of the tongue: those parts most similar to mortal speech. Others plunge so deep into the ideas of Aklo that they find it almost impossible to impart information to mortals.
Prolonged exposure to Aklo can permanently change a mortal's understanding of time or reality, typically to his detriment in functioning in the mortal realm. Attempts to understand more than a primitive smattering of Aklo (a sort of Pidgen) can result in madness, mania, or even death. Generally, this is represented in the dread and insanity rules as a moderate or major disturbing discovery.
The effects of Aklo echo through its written form as well, so mortals must beware tomes written in this tongue. Beings incapable of verbal speech (such as gugs) may still be able to understand Aklo but cannot speak or otherwise transmit it, though they may be able to write its glyphs.
Knowledge and wisdom are difficult to transmit fully by translating them from Aklo to a mortal language, and sometimes outright impossible. As no other language functions in the same way, some information is always lost or warped. While a few Aklo concepts can be delivered through other alphabets, typically the unique Aklo glyph system is necessary for full communications.

Aklo is often called "The Black Speech".