Reborn as 8yo Regency Girl, OP All the Way

Chapter 2 Elara Harrington

It took over a month for Elara to drag herself out of bed. Leaning on Mrs. Harrington’s arm, she slowly descended the staircase.

Mr. Harrington was waiting for her in the drawing-room with Theodore, all to celebrate her recovery—he’d even thrown a small party for her. Dapper gentlemen and elegantly dressed ladies filled the room, and they broke into warm applause the moment Elara appeared.

“Let us cheer for Elara’s return to health!” boomed the enthusiastic Mr. Ford, and the room echoed with cheers and toasts. In Longbourn, surviving a violent fever was seen as a blessing from the Lord, and everyone had come to the Harringtons’ not only to celebrate the girl but to give thanks for His mercy.

Guests showered Elara with gifts, and she followed Mrs. Harrington around, offering quiet thanks to each person in turn. Among the presents, a book about insects from Mr. Bennet caught her eye.

Elara had learned to read and write from Mrs. Harrington, so she could make out most of the words inside. What’s more, she’d studied English in her past life—though the language here was a little archaic, the root words were the same, and she could easily guess the meaning of the unfamiliar ones.

Though the party was in Elara’s honor, it was first and foremost a social affair for the local gentry: the married lords and ladies, the young misses of marriageable age, and the eligible gentlemen of the district. The Harringtons held a high standing in Longbourn, all thanks to Mr. Harrington’s knighthood. It carried no real political power, but it made them part of the nobility, a status that set them apart.

Clutching Mr. Bennet’s insect book, Elara took the sweet little Jane upstairs, and the two girls stayed there the whole evening—so engrossed that Elara finished the entire book by nightfall.

Jane was only four, yet she could read the words on the page, a clear sign that Mr. and Mrs. Bennet lavished great care on her education. The thought of education made Elara’s mind turn to her own future, and a sharp sense of unease pricked her. With her adult memories and mind, she saw all too clearly the suffocating limitations placed on women in this era.

In her past life as Xia Luo, she’d had a stable job and a thriving side hustle, earning a comfortable living with plenty left to save. But here, a woman working was considered unseemly—especially one from a gentleman’s family. To earn a wage would brand her as low-born, a subject of mockery. And the respectable jobs open to women were few and far between: governess, companion, seamstress, cook, or various kinds of maidservants, nothing more.

A governess needed a solid education, trained to teach etiquette, embroidery, dressmaking, the piano, painting, French, and more—it was not a role for just anyone. A companion was little more than a paid playmate for a wealthy lady, required to accompany her employer to social events, hold witty conversation, navigate social niceties, and have a modicum of worldly knowledge. Seamstresses and needlewomen could earn a decent living, and Elara was skilled at both—but she knew Mr. Harrington would never allow it. A knight’s daughter working as a seamstress would be a stain on the family’s honor, an embarrassment he would not abide. That path was closed to her, at least in the open.

Mr. Harrington had not always been a gentleman. He’d started as a merchant, amassing a fortune through trade, buying up land to transform himself into a landed gentleman. Later, he’d served as mayor, petitioned the King, and spent a small fortune to secure his knighthood—his lifelong dream of climbing the social ladder, of becoming “nobility.” To uphold this new status, he’d abandoned all business entirely, devoting himself to social life. The family’s income now came solely from land rents.

A man who’d fought so hard to escape the merchant class and join the nobility would never let his daughter dabble in trade. It would ruin the Harringtons’ reputation, make them the laughingstock of the other aristocratic families.

Elara sighed. For a lady in a gentleman’s family, the only way to secure a comfortable life was to marry a well-born, wealthy gentleman. Marriage here was never just a personal choice—it was a bargain, a way to preserve family status and fortune.

To land a good husband, a lady needed three things: wit, beauty, and a substantial dowry. None could be missing. And what galled Elara most of all was the law: a woman’s dowry became her husband’s property the moment they wed, his to do with as he pleased. In such a world, she could not bring herself to trust marriage. So she began to plot, to find a way to secure her own future, independent of any man.

The answer was clear: she needed a first-rate education, and she needed to master practical skills. Her best bet, she decided, was to become a governess for a wealthy family—respectable, above reproach—and sell her handiwork in secret. A “proper” job was non-negotiable.

But she could never voice these thoughts to her parents. In the Harringtons’ eyes, a lady’s only duty was to marry a decent gentleman and bear him an heir—a son, of course. British law barred women from inheriting land, and for the nobility and landed gentry, land was everything. This single law stripped women of all real inheritance rights, leaving them utterly dependent on male relatives.

If she were still the eight-year-old Elara, she would have accepted her fate: learn to be a perfect lady, marry a gentleman, and struggle to bear a son. But she was also Xia Luo, twenty-seven years old, a woman who had lived a life of her own making. Xia Luo would never let marriage and motherhood define her entire existence. Her life could be ordinary, she might marry, she might have children—but she would always be herself first, her own priority.

Marriage and children were the furthest things from her mind right now. Survival, and the skills to survive, were what mattered. She was eight years old, and in Longbourn, young ladies entered the marriage mart at sixteen. That gave her just eight years—eight years to build an income of her own, to secure her independence, or else be forced into a marriage she did not want.

Lost in these somber thoughts, Elara stared off into space. Jane noticed her stillness and, thinking she was tired, did not disturb her, only turned the pages of the insect book by herself, marveling at the colorful illustrations with wide, curious eyes.

Four-year-old Jane had little stamina, and soon her eyelids grew heavy. She curled up on the settee, the book still clutched in her small hands, and fell fast asleep.

Elara snapped out of her reverie and smiled softly at the sight. The little girl looked like a tiny, peaceful angel, curled up there with her book.

People always talked about wanting children of their own… could she keep this one?