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[01:15:20] Gravelord Neetro: Is there anything I could do to help jog ideas? Like...we've sort of built on three metric tons to their backstory up to DMC3.
[01:19:05] seiboo!: Hmm... maybe giving me some general idea as to how their relationship currently is, and what happened a bit prior to them entering the Hive? In terms of your backstory built with CG of course
[01:19:27] Gravelord Neetro: w e l l
[01:24:36] Gravelord Neetro: Dante's point is time when he got kidnapped was like, literally a week after DMC3; Vergil was frooooom like four and a half years after DMC3. Dante was still harboring a lot of anger and confusion and pain over everything that happened and probably would've punched Vergil's lights out if he wasn't like, dying of an infection when Dante first discovered he was actually in the city (toward the end of the Pariah event); pretty sure he wanted to anyway, but they kind of...awkwardly...managed to adjust because it became pretty clear that a lot of stuff had happened to Vergil since then and he's not exactly the same Vergil that Dante had just dealt with, considering everything that happened in DMC3 may as well be another lifetime for Vergil
[01:26:52] Gravelord Neetro: They basically have avoided dealing with either trying to answer the questions of why Vergil did what he did, or what happened to him afterward, because the former seems unbearably difficult to deal with when they could just ignore it instead (even though there are a lot of trust issues there because of it), and the latter is just emotionally and psychologically not something Vergil can handle, and Dante probably isn't sure he wants to know
[01:27:26] Gravelord Neetro: So their relationship is currently made up of ignoring all of their problems because they have no idea how to cope with anything, ever
[01:27:50] Gravelord Neetro: That's actually a good summary of their backstory as well but with more psych wards and foster care and running away
[01:41:32] Gravelord Neetro: As far as their backstory goes, though, I think I did tell you quite a bit of it more extensively sometime in the past, but basically they went to a psych ward after Eva's death to, you know, recover psychologically somewhat, went into foster care when they were 10, ran away at like 15, and then at 16 they had a fight and -- actually no I should explain the fight in some detail. I don't remember if we ever decided what exactly the fight was about, but basically, up to that point, Vergil pretty well suppressed his own stress/emotions/etc. and refused to rely on Dante for emotional support because how /could/ he? Dante was an emotional mess himself, and it was Vergil's job to support /him/, not to make matters worse by being unable to hold himself together. So he kind of sucked it up and bottled everything up and that, of course, has to rupture at some point.

The fight was less a fight and more Vergil finally losing it and yelling at Dante, unnecessarily vehemently, because /whoops/ he's pretty bad at this interpersonal relationship thing. On Dante's end, Vergil was so distant from him and so hard on him that he was always growing more bitter and resentful, because it seemed less and less like Vergil actually cared about him (even when that was Vergil doing his best not to make matters worse). He had a load of other stuff going on in his head too, like dealing with PTSD and feeling like he can never do anything or amount to anything. I...think he yelled back, too, and Vergil stormed off to try to pull himself together and calm down because he is /not/ supposed to lose his head, he can't /ever/ lose his head, he has to be an emotional pillar here...and when he went back to try to deal with things more calmly, Dante wasn't there.
[03:42:39] Gravelord Neetro: Vergil essentially assumed that the only reason /he/ had ever bothered trying to deal with human society, the only reason he had persisted and tried to make something of himself, the only person he actually cared about in the world, wanted nothing to do with him -- and was /right/ in wanting nothing to do with him. What good is he if he can't hold himself together and be the support Dante needs? All he's managed to do is hurt Dante and make him hate him. What is there left to bother with in this world?

So he sort of loses all will to live at this point? He can barely cope with his own nightmares and consequent insomnia, his bitterness and anger and hatred for himself, his loneliness, his physical condition (if he wasn't starving before, he is now) -- he has no drive to do anything, he's basically just drifting through life with this explosive anger and hatred for himself and humanity and increasing paranoia and inability to actually deal with his emotions. He hardly even interacts with anyone. Hardly has a conversation with anyone. And eventually he decides, since he can't bring himself to kill himself like anyone else would rather than slowly starve to death because their body consumes more energy than he can manage to take in, and since his brother clearly hates him and wants nothing to do with him (and what good could he do, anyway), he's going to take revenge on the one who made their lives such an endless fount of misery, or die trying. Or both. Both might be nice; he doesn't exactly plan on doing anything else with his life after that.

Dante, meanwhile... He actually has this psychological tendency to detach himself from what's going on in his life as a coping mechanism. Depersonalization is an actual psychological thing. But that was the last straw and he essentially entered a fugue state, wherein he forgot basically his entire life up to that point, rebuilt his identity as Tony a la the DMC1 novel, got heavily involved with drugs to the point where it probably would've killed him if it weren't for the fact that he's half-demon, and eventually got himself caught and forcibly put into rehab. By some miracle, they actually managed to help him to the point where he finally wanted to get better and wanted to make something of himself because...who wouldn't be sick and tired of being /nothing/ for so long, and he's got people at his back to help him get on his feet, and he's gonna become a detective and he'll -- he'll be ok. He manages to recover a great deal emotionally, even though there are still a /lot/ of holes in his memory of literally his whole life (he has a general idea and some vague memories), and stand on his own two feet and even gets the shop and starts getting everything set up. He is /so/ close, right before DMC3. He's doing so good for himself. And then Vergil's gotta come in and heck things up.

As a direct result of his spotty memory, Dante only somewhat even remembers what Vergil was actually like -- he /thinks/ he knows, he's pretty sure he really cared even though he was a pain sometimes, and he /knows/ they had some good times and loved each other (didn't they...?). DMC3 makes him question. He is confused and angry, and it's /scary/ not to know for certain  who someone really is. What if he was just making up the good brother who loved him and was his buddy to make himself feel better? And I think he tries toward the end of DMC3 to latch onto the fact that they really /did/ have that catchphrase, they really /were/ close, once, and whatever happened he just -- /misses/ his brother --

Vergil hecks up again, clearly. Because he's so embittered himself that he would sooner die than suffer more. He's been a failure in every way. He's done nothing but hurt his family or otherwise let them down. He can never be anything like Sparda, try as he might -- he's an utter /disgrace/. There's nothing left for him in the human world. The only thing there is left for him in life is to finish what he started or to die trying. Dante doesn't need him. Dante is better off /without/ him, without all the problems that would arise if he dared to stay. After all, Dante's done better for himself, alone, than Vergil could've ever managed.

I think that's most of what there is to tell, aside from Vergil's captivity in Hell... He was basically severely physically tortured and then psychologically tortured and it partly involved Mundus making clones of his family to mess w/ him in various ways, but initially it was just punishing him for defying him. and then showing emotion or pain in general. and then it's his /family/ punishing him for it so it's?? Basically really awful even though he knew it wasn't /really/ them.
[04:13:23] Gravelord Neetro: There was one particular Dante clone that didn't get why he always did things to get himself injured and eventually started trying to help him in subtle ways, like leaving him actual food (you don't wanna know what he had to eat most of the time) and other small things that he could get away with without Mundus losing his patience and like, eating him and then replacing him w/ one that would do a more effective job. So he sort of slowly actually cares about what happens to this stupid idiot, this guy whose brother he's supposed to be, who keeps prompting further abuse instead of just complying like would be logical to protect himself and survive. At one point, after Vergil has been particularly brutalized, Fakete kind of quietly slips in and calls him an idiot and moves to help staunch the bleeding, and Vergil /snarls/ at him, and he starts to say "whoa, it's just me"
[04:14:16] Gravelord Neetro: and Vergil snaps that he's not fooled
[04:14:57] Gravelord Neetro: and it's only at that point that Fakete really remembers that this isn't his face, and "me" means nothing, and this /certainly/ isn't his brother
[04:15:35] Gravelord Neetro: and he'll never be anything but an imposter
[04:15:53] Gravelord Neetro: and I think I decided that Vergil later kills him remorselessly
[04:16:22] Gravelord Neetro: That has absolutely nothing to do with challenges or really even much to do with backstory, I just felt like sharing
[10:44:06] seiboo!: Surreal... this is something to wake up to, I'm crying. Nitro you and CG need to stop making me so sad.