My dao to eternity

The rhythm of the Mu household revealed itself to Li Fan the way most rhythms did — not through any deliberate study, but through the accumulated weight of small details noticed in passing, week after week, until the pattern became too clear to mistake for coincidence.

Mu Qinghe hunted constantly. Sometimes he left alone for a single day, returning before the evening meal with nothing more dramatic to show for it than a satisfied, unhurried gait and a pack noticeably lighter than when he'd left. Sometimes he was gone five days, and Li Fan would hear Luo Yulan's voice carrying a particular edge through the shared wall on the third and fourth evenings, the kind of tension that came from counting days a husband hadn't been counted on to miss. Once, early in Li Fan's residence, Mu Qinghe disappeared for the better part of a month, and returned looking older than the weeks alone should have accounted for, his usual easy confidence noticeably diminished for some days afterward.

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