The plush velvet of the nursery chair felt alien beneath Eleanor, a stark contrast to the crisp, clean linen she recalled from her final days. But the room, with its meticulously arranged toys and pastel-colored walls, was a gilded cage, a constant reminder of the life she desperately wanted to escape. The Ainsworth legacy, she knew, was a heavy cloak, woven with privilege, expectations, and ultimately, devastating loss. She would unravel it, thread by painful thread, and weave something new, something entirely her own.

The first step, she knew, was financial independence. In her previous life, she had been disastrously reliant on her family's wealth, a weakness that had been exploited and ultimately used against her. This time, she would be armed. She remembered the dot-com boom, the stock market surges, the nascent technologies that were about to explode onto the world stage. Seven years old she might be, but her mind held the blueprints to a future of untold wealth.

Her initial attempts were met with polite amusement. "Darling," her mother, a porcelain doll of a woman named Beatrice, would coo, "what clever games you're inventing! Such a vivid imagination." Eleanor gritted her teeth, pushing down the resentment that threatened to boil over. Games, were they? She'd show them.

Her target was Arthur Ainsworth, her father, a man whose heart seemed as cold and impenetrable as the granite facade of the family mansion. He rarely spared her a glance, his attention consumed by his business empire and the endless stream of social engagements that filled his days. But Eleanor knew he had a soft spot, or rather, a professional obsession, with the stock market. Every evening, he'd retreat to his study, the air thick with cigar smoke, poring over financial reports and making calls to his brokers. This was her in.

She started small, peppering her conversations with seemingly innocent observations. "Papa," she'd say, perched on the arm of his chair while he tried to ignore her, "Mr. Henderson mentioned something about a new 'internet' company. He said it's going to be very important." Mr. Henderson was one of Arthur's most trusted business associates, a man whose opinions he respected.

Arthur would grunt, barely acknowledging her. But Eleanor persisted, feeding him carefully curated information she remembered from her previous life – the names of promising companies, the potential of emerging technologies. She framed it all as childish curiosity, a game she was playing. She'd draw fantastical pictures of "internet boxes" and tell him stories of how they could send messages across the world in an instant.

Slowly, almost imperceptibly, she saw a flicker of interest in his eyes. He began asking her questions, testing her knowledge. Eleanor, careful not to reveal too much, responded with a calculated mix of genuine insight and childish naivety. She knew she was walking a tightrope, one wrong move and he'd see through her facade.

One afternoon, she overheard him on the phone with his broker, discussing a potential investment in a fledgling company called "Amazon." Eleanor held her breath, her heart pounding. This was it. This was her chance.

Later that evening, as Arthur was preparing to leave for a dinner party, she approached him, clutching a crayon drawing of a smiling package being delivered to a house. "Papa," she said, her voice carefully modulated, "I think you should buy lots and lots of shares in that Amazon company. They're going to deliver things to everyone, everywhere! It's going to be so convenient!"

Arthur chuckled, patting her on the head. "Such an imaginative little girl," he said, but Eleanor saw the wheels turning in his head. She knew she had planted the seed.

A week later, she heard him on the phone again, instructing his broker to purchase a significant stake in Amazon. Eleanor allowed herself a small, private smile. The game had begun.

Over the next few months, Eleanor continued to subtly influence Arthur's investment decisions, guiding him towards profitable ventures while carefully masking her true intentions. The money she earned was deposited into a secret account, set up under a carefully chosen alias with the help of a complicit bank manager she subtly manipulated with her surprisingly adult demeanour and knowledge of the banking sector. She knew that accumulating a fortune as a seven-year-old would raise suspicions, so she kept the investments relatively small, but consistent. Each successful investment was a small victory, a step closer to her ultimate goal: freedom.

But financial independence was only part of the equation. Eleanor also needed to arm herself with knowledge. She couldn't rely on the limited education offered at the Ainsworth's preferred finishing school. She needed to understand the world, to navigate its complexities, to be self-sufficient in every possible way.

She started by devouring every book she could get her hands on. She frequented the local library, charming the librarians with her precocious intellect and insatiable curiosity. She read about history, science, philosophy, literature – anything and everything that piqued her interest.

But books alone weren't enough. She needed practical skills, real-world knowledge. And that, she realized, meant embracing the internet, the same technology she was using to amass her fortune.

She knew that using the family computers would raise eyebrows, so she found a way to access the internet from the library. Under the guise of researching "fun facts" for school, she began taking online courses in secret. She started with basic subjects like math and science, but quickly progressed to more advanced topics like economics, law, and even computer programming.

The online courses were challenging, but Eleanor was driven by a fierce determination. She stayed up late into the night, poring over textbooks and completing assignments, her young fingers flying across the keyboard. She learned to code, to design websites, to analyze data. She became a self-taught expert in a wide range of subjects, all while maintaining the facade of a normal seven-year-old.

The strain was immense. She was juggling two lives, one of privilege and superficiality, the other of relentless study and secret ambition. She felt like a spy in her own home, constantly on guard, afraid of being discovered.

But she knew that it was all worth it. Every dollar she earned, every skill she acquired, was a brick in the wall she was building between herself and the Ainsworth legacy. She was creating a new foundation for her life, one built on independence, self-reliance, and a unwavering determination to forge her own path. The seeds of independence were planted, and she would nurture them with every breath she took, until they blossomed into a future entirely of her own making.