Kasumi's order of thinly shaved medium-rare steak and rice noodles arrived just as Shio had opened the doors of the restaurant, and as the food was sat down she gazed across to Shio from beneath the relative cover of her hood as the waitress set everything up on the table for her. She'd recently discovered that the Orinese drink of Arandin's Lippia and Blue Mist Flower root, stewed with several aromatic spices and thickened with condensed milk, was available in the restaurant and her first order had been two glasses of those. She'd not had the drink since her childhood, and the sweet, smoky, and spicy taste of the drink complimented the flavours of her steak and noodles excellently. The restaurant was one of the few that Kasumi actually intended to pay for - whenever she was genuinely impressed with the quality of a restaurant's food or the service that was provided, she toyed with the idea of actually paying for her food, and given the combination of both excellent food and excellent service, Kasumi felt that stealing from this particular venue would invoke some sort of wrath, and the name of the restaurant inspired a strange sense of almost familiar dread, as if a "Red Nakumo" would actually swoop down and smite her for her misdeeds.

Those thoughts quickly melted away with the ice in her drinks, sat beneath the scorching sun, watching the people of Toran go by.

Shio's having a Kujaku was somewhat problematic - it would be far too much effort to actually steal anything from her under its watchful eyes and aura. It was perhaps better to hold off from stealing from this one particular woman. She looked like she was from the East too, though - and if she was seeing correctly, she certainly recognised the physical traits of one of the more prominent families of the East, and there were certain details that she recognised from the war. Odd, that they would both choose to take their Rites at the same time, but it was perhaps one of the few happy coincidences in the world.

Happy Coincidences were not something Kasumi really believed in.