#eru dmc

[mariyekos]

I've mentioned it here and there but one of my HCs is that the reason Dante looks so much older than Vergil in DMC5 is that their appearance mirrors their self perception to an extent, and he thinks of himself as older than Vergil does. Dante thinks he's a worn out old man, so he looks old(er). Vergil on the other hand sees himself as powerful and thus in good shape- and may have a skewed sense of time given how long he was in Hell, which I'd like to say is also evidenced by how young V looks- so while he's not 19, he looks somewhat younger. Or not as worn, really.

The extension of this headcanon is Dante and Vergil essentially aging out of their humanity to an extent, where maintaining their human form becomes an active thing. If Dante thought of himself as younger and put effort into it, he could look younger, and it's probably what would end up happening once he got old enough that a human would die (assuming he wanted to do so at that point). Just like how his demon side is a projection, the human side could be too. Sparda's human form wasn't his natural state. He put that up. So Dante and Vergil could probably do the same. Probably not to the extent of looking 19 again, but they could probably keep themselves looking like they were in their late 20s/early 30s for a long while if they were so inclined.

[mariyekos]

While I know there's that art of Sparda labeled Spencer that's probably meant to imply he went by Spencer while going around as a human, I think it would also be fun/reasonable for him to have just gone by Sparda because it's actually a really common name, so he saw no harm in keeping the name he liked.

I think it would be like meeting a guy named Jesus. Sure Jesus was the name of an important religious figure, but you've met like six guys named Jesus; why would you suspect the newest Jesus you've met is the Jesus rather than just some guy? His parents were probably just religious or otherwise liked the name. Not a big deal. No reason to think it means anything special.

I will say that I think it would be double fun if Sparda's legal/official human name was actually Spencer, but he told everyone he liked to call him Sparda anyway because that was the name he wanted to go by. Having his papers say Spencer reduces some potential issues, but he's attached to his name, so he calls himself that anyway. Maybe people assume Sparda is his middle name but he goes by it because he prefers it over Spencer. Maybe they don't know or suspect anything in the first place. How often do you make people show their ID to confirm their name? Sure the cashier at the liquor store might raise an eyebrow at the mismatch, but Sparda just shrugs and they don't make a big deal of it because why would they? He's nice and definitely over 21. Not their problem if the guy doesn't like his name but hasn't bothered to get it legally changed. It's a pain anyway.

(When Dante starts going by Tony Redgrave- or rather, when he goes back to telling people he's named Dante even if his papers still say he's Tony Redgrave- it's yet another similarity he has to his father. If Vergil pointed this out post-DMC5, I think it would make Dante uncomfortable. His feelings on their father are complex and he's not sure how he feels about this particular similarity. It's not as though he only just realized it, but up until this point he'd never met someone who had enough information to connect the dots and point it out, so he's never had to deal with it in a capacity beyond a passing thought.)