Lost Paradise of Karuta

Shataro cannot sleep. Night after night, he lies awake, and the insomnia has gone on long enough that the boundaries around ordinary consciousness have started to blur. Then a pure white figure appears — a shinigami — and offers a specific trade: she will tell him stories every night until sleep finally comes. The stories she tells are not comfortable ones. They are accounts of sins and the punishments attached to them, drawn from the ancient tales she carries. The stories concern him more than he initially understands. Sleep will come when something specific has been resolved. The shinigami will keep speaking until it is.