I agree with you that BTC is attractive because of its decentralized nature, protecting it from government surveillance and inflation. Moreover, history has shown that its price increase has great potential, supported by the ever-evolving blockchain technology. Therefore, BTC clearly has long-term value as the most profitable investment.
Bitcoin's decentralized nature is of course its most exciting feature that most of us love and that's the reason why most of us use Bitcoin, but these days people most likely consider Bitcoin as an asset that has potential of growth and that can be a good store of value as well as a tool to fight inflation. It's limited in supply and that makes it deflationary.
It's true that some people still use Bitcoin because of its decentralized nature but the investors don't really look for that feature but for its deflationary features. They want to increase their investment value overtime and that's why they buy Bitcoin and HODL it for long term so they can earn great ROI.
Nowadays, creating a virtual asset with a limited supply is no longer difficult, but creating a decentralized asset like bitcoin is almost impossible. If bitcoin becomes centralized, its deflationary features will not help its value increase over time. The value of bitcoin depends on its use cases combined with its supply, not just on its supply.
Theoretically, given bitcoin's limited supply, it could be considered a good store of value as well as a hedge against inflation. But given its volatility, I don't think bitcoin is as good a hedge against inflation as we would hope.