My Daddy Hides His Power - Chapter 250

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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 conceals his strength
Chapter 250
A moment of silence fell—
Enoch and Cheshire, who had been staring at each other, drew their blades simultaneously and coated them with Mana without hesitation.
The first move swordsmen take when fighting to ignore each other’s shields.
As expected, Enoch had been brainwashed by the Emperor, but he moved purely by instinct.
‘I have to do this.’
Cheshire closed his eyes, then opened them.
The world reflected in his crimson pupils slowed.
With murderous intent blazing in his gaze, Enoch raised his sword arm in languid motion.
A blue Sword Aura unfurled outward.
Yet that Sword Aura alone,
remained swift and razor-sharp in a world where everything else had turned sluggish.
Clang!
The moment he raised his blade to block,
‘Just as I thought.’
Cheshire laughed quietly, feeling the tremor of his arm as electricity raced through it.
It was a depth of power Enoch had never shown in dozens, hundreds of matches before.
* * *
One month ago.
“This time, fight with your eyes open.”
It was their last sparring match before preparations for war began.
Enoch’s words—”fight with your eyes open”—meant to unlock an ability that belonged to Cheshire alone.
That is to say, eyes that could control the density of time.
When his eyes opened, time flowed slowly, and all attacks approached at a crawl.
It was certainly a certain-victory technique, but….
Whoosh!
“How about it? Slower than before?”
There was only one exception: the Sword Aura that Enoch threw.
Every swordsman’s Sword Aura had different speed, attack power, and range.
And unfortunately, Enoch’s Sword Aura pierced through even the densest layer of time he could conjure.
……
Seeing Cheshire shake his head with a darkened expression, Enoch approached and collapsed beside him.
The two sat in silence for a long while.
“…Cheshire.”
“Yes.”
“I have always fought with all my strength when sparring with you, but I cannot guarantee that’s my maximum power.”
Enoch opened his palm and gazed at it as he continued.
“Right now, my body instinctively fights with the thought that I must not kill you.”
……
“But after I’m brainwashed by the Emperor, I will be different. I will move solely by the instinct that I must kill you. Then a depth will emerge that even I don’t know I possess.”
……
“If you judge that it’s too difficult to match, the very first thing you should do is aim for both my arms and sever them so I cannot hold a blade. That will make suppression easier.”
Cheshire did not answer, biting his lip.
If it came to that, Enoch would be difficult to recover from. He knew that because he was such a powerful Ability User, reversing the damage would demand an enormous price even from Lilis’s power.
“You will fight with the Sacred Object, but in truth, it merely puts you and me on equal footing.”
Sacred Object—the Sword of Judgment.
When it blocks an opponent’s attack, the blade absorbs the Mana contained in that attack and transmits it to the wielder.
The same Dos, but with a stark difference in Mana capacity. However, a blade that would bridge that innate gap.
But….
“You will not tire, will you, Your Grace?”
“…Likely not.”
Just as Enoch said, the Sacred Object merely allowed them to fight as equals.
No matter if he unleashed hundreds, thousands of Sword Auras, he could never exhaust Enoch.
“You cannot defeat me.”
Enoch sensed it dimly.
The final battle.
That day’s outcome would tilt toward Cheshire’s defeat.
Unlike in the ‘failed timeline,’ Enoch now had a daughter to protect, and a prayer to grow stronger for her sake had made him stronger with every moment.
“But….”
You won’t be able to win this.
But—
“…You have to win, Cheshire.”
You have to win.
To Cheshire, the words that Enoch had desperately tried to conceal rang out crystal clear.
You have to win, Cheshire.
…Even if it costs me my life.
* * *
Bang, bang, bang—!
Enoch’s Sword Aura streamed forth in relentless succession, without a moment’s pause.
The Emperor’s Advisor, Ramon, trembled with dread as he watched the terrible display of power unfold before his eyes.
‘Is he even human…?’
It was no accident that he was called the Empire’s greatest Ability User.
Even Cheshire seemed helpless before such overwhelming force—
‘What… what is that supposed to be?’
Cheshire, who should never have closed the distance against such a relentless barrage, instead
—bang, bang, bang—!
evaded Enoch’s attacks, deflected them, blocked half of them with his blade, and drew near like a flash of light.
Impossible movement.
‘No, my eyes weren’t deceiving me. How can a person move like that?’
His speed was nothing short of supernatural—measured in meters per second.
Cheshire rushed forward trailing faint afterimages, his blade crashing down in a torrent of attacks.
Clang—!
The two men’s blades locked together.
A desperate test of strength.
As the exchanges continued over the next few moments, Ramon’s mouth fell slowly open.
It was Enoch who bore the wounds.
Cheshire’s subtle movements denied any lethal opening even at that close range, and instead his blade carved across Enoch’s body again and again.
‘Wait. That madman, is he…?’
Ramon’s eyes widened as he watched the combat unfold.
He’d assumed one of them would have to die for this to end.
‘Surely not…? He’s trying to subdue Enoch Rubinstein without killing him?’
Even to Ramon’s untrained eye, it became starkly apparent.
Enoch’s blade was wielded to kill, but Cheshire’s blade was aimed at delivering only the minimal damage necessary—to render his opponent unable to fight.
Crash—!
Meanwhile, two mages from the Emperor’s Guard unleashed their attacks as well.
“…….”
But Cheshire evaded them too, pressing relentlessly toward Enoch once more.
The Guard’s support.
Enoch’s Sword Aura cascading down whenever the distance increased.
Despite such overwhelming disadvantage,
Cheshire kept charging forward.
He fixated obsessively on Enoch’s limbs and tendons—the sites where strength flowed.
Only those places where complete recovery would be possible once the battle ended.
‘He could afford to lose an arm and still come out ahead, yet here he is fighting at such a disadvantage? He could die if he’s not careful.’
More than that—as if to prove some point—he refused to draw upon his Sword Aura at all.
No sacrifice,
no cost whatsoever. His sole intention was to take only the Emperor’s life.
Ramon swallowed hard and stole a glance at the Emperor watching the battle.
‘He’s become a withered old man. How many days longer will he live…?’
Judging by how he could barely stand, the Emperor had expended his Life Force to the point where he couldn’t even deploy a Shield.
All that remained to him now were his brainwashed forces, and what awaited him was merely death drawing near as his lifespan ran out.
Ramon offered an early eulogy for his master’s pitiful state.
‘A truly vicious man….’
Though he must have foreseen his own end, the Emperor had not fled—he had brainwashed Enoch instead.
To die on the throne.
His will was to perish as the ruler crowned with an emperor’s diadem.
Whoosh—!
Then,
between Enoch and Cheshire, locked in combat, a line of blue flames blossomed forth to mark the boundary.
‘Damn it.’
Cheshire bit his lip and widened the distance between himself and Enoch.
The moment he blocked Enoch’s first assault—the one now under Brainwashing—he already understood that all their countless sparring matches until now had been utterly meaningless.
The hidden strength Enoch himself hadn’t known he possessed was truly staggering.
And, just as Lilis had said.
“Father will grow stronger even as he fights.”
Even in this moment, he was ceaselessly breaking through his limits, growing stronger.
Enoch instinctively read the pattern of his opponent’s attacks, and now he seemed to have even noticed the flow of time that ran differently only for Cheshire.
The way he drew a boundary with flame around himself, widening the distance—
It must have been because he realized that close combat put him at a disadvantage.
‘I should have ended this before my full power was read.’
With every clash of blades, Cheshire despaired as he recalled Enoch’s movements that pierced through the density of time and kept pace with him.
Even within a flow of time that ran differently for each of them, Enoch was erasing the gap where Cheshire barely held the advantage.
“Father can’t help but grow stronger. God, Primera, blessed him unconditionally with victory—”
Enoch’s body, moving instinctively to ignore his limits—
“—because he is the hero of this world.”
Whoosh—!
At that moment, Enoch’s Sword Aura shot out toward empty air.
Crash!
The ornate Chandelier hanging from the Grand Hall’s ceiling fell, blocking the escape route.
And in an instant.
Enoch, who had closed the distance to arm’s reach.
Clang!
Cheshire barely blocked Enoch’s blade, but his retreat was now cut off.
“Ugh.”
Enoch pushed him down, mounted him, and held his blade horizontally across his throat.
The two swords, pressed together as they barely held, ground down against Cheshire’s neck.
“Gh—agh.”
“…….”
Again, a brutal test of strength.
As if to crush his enemy’s throat outright, tremendous force poured into Enoch’s hands that gripped the blade.
Cheshire gritted his teeth and endured, staring into Enoch’s unfocused eyes.
Since Enoch had overcome the limits of his body, the slowly flowing time was no longer Cheshire’s ally.
“Ha—ugh.”
His pressed throat burned with pain.
“……Sever both my arms so I cannot wield a blade.”
Truth be told, there had been several chances to subdue Enoch, but Cheshire had not taken them. He wanted to keep Enoch intact and alive.
But that, too, was arrogance.
Enoch stood at the apex of power—a height no human strength could ever reach.
And worse, with each passing moment, he was growing stronger by overcoming his own limits.
“Agh. Ggh—”
Cheshire clenched his teeth and drove force into his sword-arm. Slowly, Enoch was forced back.
Then.
‘Ah.’
Blue Mana rippled across Enoch’s blade.
Sword Aura.
If hit by a Sword Aura at this distance, Cheshire would die instantly.
“……?”
And yet.
The gathered Mana scattered, dispersed.
Cheshire was stunned. Beyond Enoch’s unfocused eyes, he found a shred of will still remaining.
Ah—you, even now.
Even now you were struggling ceaselessly, clawing desperately to break free from the Brainwashing.
“Cough—!”
Because of that, perhaps. Far away, the Emperor staggered, spitting blood.
Enoch’s blue eyes, wavering.
‘Do not hesitate, Cheshire.’
‘Please… kill me…’
Within those eyes, Enoch’s voice screamed in desperation.
“Cheshire…. Please…. Don’t kill Father…. Save him….”
At that crossroads of choice, Cheshire’s face contorted in agony.
“Damn—damn it all, you—”
The Emperor, staggering moments before, snapped his eyes open with fierce concentration.
Blue Mana gathered once more upon Enoch’s blade, which had dimmed in his gaze.

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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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