My Daddy Hides His Power - Chapter 131

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Father concealed his power
131
* * *
There was no skip button, but fortunately the days passed swiftly.
Ten years trapped in the tower.
All of it absorbed into my mind, complete and unbroken.
“Ahahaha! So pretty!”
“What? This isn’t pretty at all!”
Another day, same as always.
I sat hunched in the corner, hugging my knees, watching Oscar and myself.
Not even sketchpaper was enough—I’d drawn ridiculous doodles across Oscar’s face.
Oscar grumbled at his ruined reflection in the mirror, but there was no anger in it, only giggling.
‘Even now, he forgives me. He really is my master.’
Laughter spilled out without resistance.
“Kyahahaha!”
I laughed freely and leaned into Oscar, and he wrapped his arms around me, tenderly stroking my hair.
At that sight, something caught in my chest.
My face twisted.
‘Now I understand it all.’
Why Oscar cherished me so.
‘This… he practically raised me.’
I couldn’t even speak properly, a fool who called out for Father dozens, hundreds of times a day while staring out the window—nothing but an idiot.
And because of me, he became someone who couldn’t say a word, couldn’t take a single action, a slave.
He lost his freedom.
What was there about me to make me so precious.
“Ugh.”
I wiped away the tears sliding down my face.
For all those ten years, we were everything to each other.
Without him, how could I have endured this hell alone.
“Listen to me carefully.”
That’s when Oscar spoke, his voice turning serious.
I swallowed my tears and opened my ears.
“Today, you must not come out under any circumstances. Whatever happens. You have to stay hidden, no matter what.”
“Huh?”
“Hide and Seek. You remember we practiced it here before, right?”
“Yes!!!”
“You absolutely cannot come outside. Now, promise me.”
“I pwomise!”
Watching the two of us linking our little fingers, I understood.
‘It’s today.’
The day of revolution.
The very day I was meant to die.
“Hey, you idiot.”
After Oscar left, I called out to myself alone.
There was no answer.
“Your teacher told you to play Hide and Seek, so why didn’t you listen?”
If I’d stayed hidden, if I’d stayed perfectly still.
Maybe then I would have lived.
“No, wait. If I had…”
Everyone but me would have died.
By then, the Emperor’s final command was already branded into me—to annihilate all Non-ability Users.
“Take care, Lilis.”
I mimed patting the head of my own foolish, vacant-eyed self.
“You’ve suffered enough, me.”
With my death, everything would end, and I could awaken from this dream.
I made myself a promise.
“I won’t let it happen the same way. I’ll survive, no matter what.”
So this tragedy will not repeat.
“Thank you so much… for everything you’ve endured…”
Then.
Though I shouldn’t have been able to see anything, I fell into the illusion that I had turned and our eyes had met.
That foolish grin, as always.
Yet his eyes brimmed with tears.
As if answering my words of comfort about how hard he’d worked.
In that moment.
‘Ah.’
My vision inverted.
At the same time, an unfamiliar yet familiar face appeared before me.
Suspended between boy and man.
An expressionless face, eyes burning a dull crimson.
‘…Cheshire.’
No doubt it was Cheshire, grown tall over ten years.
‘Well, this is….’
I understood then.
I, who had been observing from a distance all this while—
‘…it’s rather cruel.’
—at this final moment, I had become myself directly.
Cheshire approaching to kill me.
「Cheshire Rubinstein turned away from his father’s wailing voice and walked forward without hesitation toward his daughter, the last Primera.
He could not afford to hesitate, not even for a moment. Innocent lives were still vanishing without a trace even now.
He was colder than anyone.
Not a flicker of doubt, not a moment’s thought, not a shred of pity or guilt written on his face as he drew his blade.」
The instant our eyes met.
I understood why this time I was not the observer.
The final Cheshire’s resolve, which the original work described as utterly without hesitation.
And yet.
‘No. He was suffering.’
An emotion others could not read.
A glint in his eyes I could never have deciphered if I hadn’t known him.
To make me understand that….
Cheshire approached with eyes cold as ice, concealing anguish and compassion, and swung his blade toward me.
‘Aah.’
I squeezed my eyes shut.
* * *
In the south, Argonia.
When Oscar channeled Mana into the completed Magic Circle, a blue light seeping into the ground spread outward like tree roots toward some distant place.
The light led into a forest not far away.
“We’ve found a space with Seal Magic cast over it. Whether it’s a Ruin or something else, we’ll need to draw another Magic Circle once we get there, so let’s hurry.”
“Wait.”
Enoch rose and stopped Oscar as he moved to take the lead.
“Is it that forest? That place is dangerous. It’s where the Demon Beasts of Argonia nest. I went in a few months back and cleared them all out, but….”
“And that’s a problem because?”
Oscar was puzzled.
Unexpectedly showing weakness?
But then, he was taken aback by the way Enoch’s gaze swept over him from head to toe, as if doubting his abilities.
Is he worried about me?
“Wow. I can’t believe this.”
The youngest Master of the Magic Tower, no less.
Oscar’s pride crumbled to dust.
“You just focus on yourself. I don’t want to see you stumbling around like an idiot, losing an arm or a leg, bawling to your dad about it.”
“No, I’m fine. Did I hurt your feelings? You’re a genius. I was just worried your valuable self might get hurt.”
“At least insult me convincingly.”
The two bickered as they headed toward the forest.
As they entered, Enoch snapped off a Branch and gripped it in his hand.
Oscar frowned.
“You’re not seriously taking that as a weapon, are you?”
“Yeah. I came in a rush and left my sword behind.”
Though it made no sense, time was of the essence, so Oscar quickened his pace into the forest.
Rotting tree roots and wildly overgrown sharp grass everywhere.
After roughly ten minutes of hacking through rough terrain with no path, following where the blue Mana light pointed the way.
Shwish―!
An unfamiliar presence made itself known.
At the same moment, a grotesquely shaped Demon Beast dove down from above.
‘Well, there’s everything under the sun.’
Oscar swiftly conjured a Shield around himself without much concern.
Around himself alone, of course.
“Oops!”
Whoosh―!
But the Demon Beast split in two from a brilliant blue Blade Aura before it could close the distance.
“You all right?”
Enoch held a Branch wrapped in Blade Aura, studying Oscar with concerned eyes.
…….
Well, a weapon’s a weapon, isn’t it.
“Yes, well. I’m fine.”
Enoch noticed that Oscar had thrown a Shield around only himself, and he blinked slowly.
“Mm, yes. You look fine.”
Then he added something very quietly and resumed walking.
“…With that kind of character, you’d survive anywhere. That’s a relief.”
“What did you say?”
“Nothing. Oh, it breaks off here?”
The blue Mana flowing from the Detection Magic Circle had stopped at a certain point.
Without being asked, Enoch briskly cleared away rocks and weeds, making space for Oscar to draw the Magic Circle.
“This should work, right?”
He even found a suitable stone and placed it in Oscar’s hand, asking with satisfaction.
…….
Oscar narrowed his eyes and gave Enoch a sideways glance before beginning to draw the Magic Circle.
He had to blend the Magic Formula that sensed the hidden Ruin with the Magic Formula that unsealed it….
It was an exceptionally delicate task.
‘How did that man manage this alone before?’
Oscar glanced at Enoch, who stood watching their surroundings, and wondered.
In his previous life, it seemed he’d likely obtained some sacred object after seeing the Magic Formula that Robel had stolen for him….
‘Even knowing the formula would’ve been difficult.’
But soon he nodded to himself.
‘Well, he’s the father of our child. He ought to manage at least that much.’
Of course, he never admitted that Enoch was remarkable.
It was simply because he was born as the father of the ‘genius’ Lilis.
“Come here. I’m done drawing.”
As Enoch stepped into the Magic Circle, Oscar channeled Mana to activate it.
At the same moment, the ground beneath them dropped away vertiginously.
“Wow.”
Enoch let out a gasp of wonder.
A strange space with no exit.
It was a Ruin where crumbling, fractured ancient white stone walls sprawled like a labyrinth in every direction.
“Master of the Magic Tower, wait here for a moment. I don’t know what might be inside, so let me go ahead and check first.”
Oscar looked at Enoch with weary eyes.
What on earth did this man take him for?
Treating someone versed in all forms of magic like he was minding a three-year-old.
“Yes, yes― do as you please then.”
But if there really was something dangerous, well.
At least he’d take the hit first if needed.
“I’ll be back shortly.”
Enoch disappeared to scout the interior.
As Oscar waited, glancing around…
‘What is that?’
His eye caught a stone lodged in the floor like a gravestone.
Characters written on the partially shattered stone.
Ancient Language.
Now forgotten and lost, readable by no one.
“Let me see.”
Oscar knelt down and began to read it.
Of course, he could read the Ancient Language.
After all, that’s what you needed to draw thousands upon thousands of unpublished Magic Formulas.
……
Oscar’s eyes grew colder as he read on.
It was a Revelation.
Probably something the ancient priests—whoever had once owned this Ruin—had heard long ago….
The voice of the Goddess, Primera.

A Hero?
That would be, perhaps….
“Master of the Magic Tower, let’s depart. I see no danger ahead.”
Oscar stared intently at Enoch, who had returned.
Yes. That man.
And the Sacrificial Offering.
The Sacrificial Offering shall be of the Hero’s blood,
my final strength—
that was Enoch’s child and the last Primera,
Lilis.
a shield of sacrifice—
The Revelation was saying it plain.
Lilis had been created from the beginning for the purpose of sacrifice.
When all my divine authority is withdrawn,
then at last shall peace descend upon this land.
Oscar understood that much.
The day all the Goddess’s power vanished.
Only the complete annihilation of Primera could bring the peace everyone desired.
Which meant….
Lilis too, had to disappear.
“How absurd.”
Oscar laughed, sharp and bitter.
“…Master of the Magic Tower?”
It was truly laughable.
Some fool had handed a blade to a demon and spawned a burning hell—and now, who exactly was supposed to fix that catastrophe?
Oscar laid his hand upon the stone bearing the Revelation.
A trace of Mana seeped into it,
“Go find your own solution.”
“What?”
Crack-crack-crack—!
In the next moment it shattered into fragments and crumbled to dust, scattering on the wind.
This worthless drivel was now unknowable to anyone.
Oscar rose to his feet without emotion.
Enoch stood frozen, eyes wide, mouth gaping open as he watched Oscar stand.
“But….”
“Let’s go.”
Oscar passed by him calmly, without a glance.
Enoch swallowed hard and slowly turned to watch him leave.
“If you’re angry, you could just say so….”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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