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Dante’s face turned completely purple with rage. Desperate over the 100000-orb debt that had just dropped out of thin air, he instantly thought of his most reliable "ally". Sneaking backward, Dante snatched the phone and dialed a secret underworld code, calling straight into an unfamiliar timeline.
"Devil May Cry... Who's this? If it's a debt collector, I'm not home." The voice on the other end belonged to a middle-aged man, sounding incredibly smooth, casual, and in his absolute prime.
"Save me please, myself!" Dante whimpered, quickly summarizing Vergil’s head-patting stunt and the 19-year-old brat’s extortion scheme. "You're richer than me, save me with a hundred thousand orbs!"
The man in Fortuna burst into a hearty laugh. "Hey me. You're the one who has lived through all of our phases, shouldn't you know best? We... have never been rich."
The laughter from the other end was filled with deep empathy, but also a matching... severe lack of funds.
"However, money isn't the solution to everything. I have a way to help you!"
"What way?" Old Dante’s eyes lit up.
"Just wait for it."
-
Slam!
Right after the phone hung up, a tall figure in red coat immediately bolted out of the Fortuna office. Not far away, a gentle, aristocratic figure in a sleek blue coat was walking along the street. He was reclusively hiding under an old shawl to evade all attention, only to suddenly have his shoulders locked tight by a highly suspicious man rushing out of nowhere.
The suspect reached out with his massive, rough hand and began frantically ruffling, aggressively kneading the young man's stylish, slicked-back platinum hair, ignoring the victim’s sharp yelps as the he fought back with every single move in his arsenal.
"Well, kiddo, you only have yourself to blame!" The suspicious man laughed boisterously while scratching away, turning the young man's hair into nothing short of a literal bird's nest.
The young man was massaged into a state of ultimate grievance and sheer bewilderment. He had no idea what kind of sudden madness had possessed the guy in red. Escaping the head-ruffling storm, the youth held his messy hair trembling with pure rage. Given his unyielding nature, he immediately used the elegant blade at his hip to slice open a massive spatial rift, determined to track down the "source" of this insanity.
Ringgg~~
Dante was waiting anxiously when the phone rang. He eagerly picked it up "How did it go, me? Is justice served?"
"DANTE!!! TELL YOUR FUTURE SELF, PAST SELF, OR WHATEVER ABOMINATION THAT IS TO STOP RIGHT NOW!" A young, melodious, yet fiercely angry voice roared through the receiver, dripping with pent-up frustration.
"How dare you mess up my hair! Add one hundred thousand red orbs to your debt!"
Click… Tone… Tone…
Dante stared blankly before putting the receiver down. He slumped sideways, burying his face into the desk, crying tears of absolute financial ruin.
How pathetic! The debt had now doubled to two hundred thousand orbs. To make matters worse, he had to bitterly swallow all this from his own damn selves. Nineteen-year-old Dante got a tender caress from Vergil, middle-aged Dante in Fortuna got to personally pin Vergil down and forcibly ruffle his hair to blow off steam. Only him, this lonely, pitiful, heavily indebted old uncle, ended up with no one to pat his head, and no one's head to pat!
"Nobody loves me..." Dante mumbled, closing his eyes in self-pity as he curled up on the desk to hide from the cruel reality.
Vergil sat in the corner of the room, witnessing the entire dramatic collapse of his brother's finances and mental sanity. Looking at Dante's curled-up form, his shoulders trembling faintly, Vergil found himself struggling... to suppress a laugh. Already fifty and his “little” brother still putting on the miserable act of an abandoned big puppy watching its owner bring another pups home. Vergil found it utterly hilarious, and yet, a tiny bit endearing.
What an idiot, getting jealous of his own selves for what? Aren't they all Dante? If I didn't care about him, why would I even bother comforting the other “him”? Whether Vergil stays or leaves, when has he ever stopped caring about him? Fooling around like this, only to invite trouble upon himself.
Vergil gently set his book down. His footsteps were incredibly light, making absolutely no sound as he slowly approached the desk. He stood in silence, looking down at Dante’s messy white hair, weathered by the storms of time.
With a helpless sigh, Vergil raised his leather-gloved hand and lowered it to comfort his "fast asleep" brother. Foolish Dante, always throwing tantrums just to feel pampered by his older brother.
His hair was neater now compared to when he fought Urizen. Back then, he had been trapped inside the demonic tree for a long time, and his mental state was a mess. Come to think of it, even before that, he had never paid much attention to his appearance or physique.
Ever since walking by Vergil’s side, Dante had, neither fast nor slowly, grown more cheerful day by day, learning to take better care of himself. Not too much, but he’s improving. The style remained rugged and reckless, but he had shaved his beard and trimmed his hair neatly past his eyelids. Even that heavy sigh used to lace into his voice seemed to have vanished somewhere along the way.
People said Vergil looked younger. He hadn't looked into mirrors much back in the day, but looking at each other now, they seemed about the same age. Vergil rarely showed emotions, leaving his face free of expression lines, and he always maintained his poised demeanor and posture. Dante, on the other hand, actually looked a bit more playful now, more open. Who knows, maybe he was growing younger, returning to the old days of causing trouble, throwing tantrums, preening his style, and turning around to tease his old brother just to get attention. Because he needed love, and love kept him young.
Vergil's fingers gently twirled a few strands of hair near Dante's temple, lightly scratching the crown of the messy mop that had just been tangled up by the news of the debt.
"Woaahhh!"
Ten minutes past, Dante suddenly bolted up like a coiled spring, his hands clamping tightly around Vergil's wrists, his icy blue eyes wide and gleaming with an scheming light. A massive, triumphant grin spread across his face, so wide his jaw almost unhinged.
"AHA! CAUGHT YOU RED-HANDED, OLD MAN!!!!" Dante bellowed.
At the same time, the telephone, which hadn't been fully hung up, abruptly switched to speakerphone, blasting the synchronized, ecstatic laughter of both a teenage and a middle-aged voice from both ends of the line, "Hahaha! It worked!"
Vergil froze. His eyes narrowed as a murderous aura began to radiate.
"What is the meaning of this...?"
"Nothing, nothing! Heheh. Keep going." Dante leaned his head right back into Vergil's palm, narrowing his eyes in pure bliss.
Through the speakerphone, the other two Dantes somehow managed to high-five each other across space "He finally got his head pat! What a brilliant pity-play tactic, haha"
Vergil’s face was now darker than the lowest depths of the Underworld. He realized that he, a genius intellect, a once-dreaded dark lord, had just been blatantly hoodwinked by three idiotic versions of his younger brother, all co-conspiring just to score a single head pat.
"Dante..." Vergil’s voice dropped, ice-cold to the bone. Snatching his hand away from Dante's hair, he placed it firmly on the hilt of the Yamato.
"You Shall Die!!!"
"Whoa, whoa, your hand already touched my head, so you gotta finish what you started!" Dante, completely unafraid of death, grabbed Vergil's hand himself and rubbed it against his head a few more times.
"Thanks, brother! Debt canceled! And now... RUN FOR YOUR LIVES, BOYS!"
Dante immediately let go, leaping over the sofa just as a Judgement Cut from the Yamato flashed through, slicing the couch and the piles of junk stacked on it into absolute shreds.
"Scum!!!"
The Devil May Cry office exploded once again that day into the familiar sounds of wreckage and combat. Yet right in the middle of the battle, Dante kept laughing out loud as he fled. The plan was a roaring success, his pride was completely restored, and most importantly, no matter the timeline, Dante had gotten his head pat.