"Then, there's this restaurant with Amatsu cuisine that is to die for, I hope you'll like it."

"Hm."

Another advantage of the restaurant is that it's reasonably close to the eastern city gate, so they don't have to walk that long.

They don't exude Adventurer Energy™ yet, but Annika in particular has more than enough "I will mow you down" energy to make up for it; no peddlers try to bother them, and no urchins try to pick their pockets.

The restaurant is decorated like the owner wanted to cram in as many elements of Amatsu culture into a single place as they could: paper lanterns, cherry blossoms, tiny trees, ideograms painted in fake inkbrush, serpentine dragons, the whole shebang. It results in an atmosphere that you can't quite find anywhere else—certainly not in Amatsu itself—and it has its own charm.

(Laying it on a bit thick if you ask him.)

Annika looks... curious. There's a spark of interest in her eye as she takes in the environment, her gaze barely moving but nevertheless looking at everything.

(She can't do the thing Fists can, where they only need a single glance at something to know almost everything they need to know about it, but she's been practising, and she will resist the urge to move her eyes every which way.)

...that's kind of adorable, actually. He grabs a table for the two of them and asks, "Are you familiar with Amatsu—in general, culture and cuisine and all?"

She's brought back to reality by his question and tries to settle back into her usual scowl. "Not very."

It's weird that the table is so low and that they have to kneel rather than sit, but interesting.

"Then I'm honoured to introduce you to a small part of it."

...she doesn't like his smile. It's too, too... she doesn't know. But it makes her feel uncomfortable.

He doesn't think it does, actually. 

"So what have you been up to?"

"Training."

"No bounties?"

"No time."

"I'm sure you could find the time. How about we do one together sometime soon?"

"...maybe."

A waitress chooses this moment to show up with the menus. "I come back to collect your orders in a little," she says in a pretty strong accent. "Please make yourselves comfortable." She bows and leaves.

Annika accepts the menu and starts scanning through it. "...I don't know what any of this is."

"Raw fish with rice."

"No, I mean it, most of it is raw fish with rice. We could get a sampling platter if you would like to try it out."

...you know what, sure, why not, she's here already. She's not sure why she's here, but. She nods.

"And I assume no rice wine?"

"I don't drink alcohol."