A provincial graduate could actually already become an official.
The famous Zuo Zongtang had been a provincial graduate and even rose to become a high-ranking regional official.
Of course, that had been during troubled times.
And the current era of Dream of the Red Chamber stood at the threshold of chaos; in thirty years at most, the world would descend into turmoil.
The vitality of Feudal Society was brief. If someone lived a long life and was born at the founding of a dynasty, by the time he died, that dynasty would basically have entered its late stage. He would be able to clearly witness its rise, decline, and replacement.
Jia Rong was a provincial graduate. To those in the Jia Family, he should at least have been able to secure a lucrative post as a County Magistrate in Jiangnan. Yet he had been sent to some southern island. If someone had not obstructed him, what else could it be? At this time, serving as an official in some remote frontier was equivalent to exile in another form.
Naturally, they did not know that Jia Lian, Jia Baoyu, and Jia Rong had arranged it together.
Jia Rong arrived on a southern island, with Jia Lian and Big Fool Xue accompanying him as he took office.
The population exceeded sixty thousand, and every one of them was destitute. Many had only one set of clothes all year round. Fortunately, this was the tropics, so they did not need much clothing.
Very few people owned land. Most made their living as day laborers or long-term hired hands.
All the other land belonged to the gentry and local chieftains.
Jia Rong had not come alone to take office. He had brought one hundred and twenty attendants—eighty servants and forty guards. In any