"Magistrate, is it truly necessary to retrieve my student records from my hometown just to purchase a position as a Licentiate?"
Zhao An summoned his courage to ask this seemingly redundant question, hoping to uncover a loophole in the procedure. The truth was that, let alone a student record, he didn't even have a valid educational background. Jiang En, the primary school headmaster who had forged his documents, had made it perfectly clear: while the Licentiate certificate was authentic-looking, there was no file for him in the county archives. If there was no file, what was there to retrieve? It would be best to skip that step entirely. Couldn't they just make an exception?
The Magistrate’s reply was blunt: "That goes without saying. Without the records, how can I process your application? How can the Prefecture submit your status?"
Chapter 44