Melinoë was taken away from her parents and brother shortly after her birth for her own safety, so she has no memories of them whatsoever. It's made worse by Hecate inadvertently rendering the whole thing moot by raising Mel up to become Chronos's slayer. And unlike Zagreus, who got to learn more about the world on his own terms, Melinoë was raised since infancy to be a warrior, meaning she was never really able to carve her own path beyond what her beloved Headmistress genuinely thought was best.
It's made worse by the fact that Hades told Hecate to just take care of her. His shocked expression when he meets his daughter in Tartarus only proves he likely didn't want her to get involved at all.
Many of the enemies in Erebus are malformed, twisted souls who are forced to wander and went insane ever since the House of Hades was invaded, with the Fields of Mourning being lined with a large amount of spirits who are left with nowhere to go while the war between gods and titans are raging. Melinoe was a baby when Hecate took her - think about how long it must have been for mere mortals and how the war would affect them.
Chronos make good on his words, ushering humanity into Golden Age under his rule... and subjecting any souls not with him to endless armies of undead, man-eating cyclopes and being captured to fuel a barrier blocking Mel's path to Olympus. Even being dead here would not give any respite, all to serve the selfishness of a few people.
The fact that Persephone was denied the chance to see her child grow up yet again, this time due to circumstances completely out of her control, and that Zagreus never really got the chance to be an older brother to Melinoë. Hades could only regret how he wished they could have been a peaceful family if not for Chronos coming back to overtake his House.
Mixed with Heartwarming is how Mel keeps a portrait of her family holding her as a baby. Just the fact that the prompt to interact with it is "brood" tells you how much she's hurt by her given situation.
Deep within Tartarus, Mel stumbles into Lord Hades himself, who is chained up and horribly enslaved. He tells his daughter that it's pointless to fight Chronos and tells her to leave before the titan finds her.
The fate of Cerberus, corrupted by Chronos and forced to become a boss the player must fight. And the item you get for defeating him is tears. Worse still, unlike Zagreus and the other members of the household, Cerberus isn't friendly to Mel even once free of corruption and will actually growl at Mel if she attempts to pet him, perhaps because he's not familiar with her and thus remains wary.
You can find Cerberus later in Tartarus, beside Hades. In the same chamber, if you look closely behind Cerberus, you'll find a third occupant: Bouldy. To add salt to the wound, Sisyphus is nowhere to be found either. Though, it's revealed that the former king allowed Hades to stay in his prison room and have Bouldy keep him company.
The Queen arcana requires a Tear to unlock. The dog still thinks of its owner.
Nemesis winds up going a bit too far in a spat with Melinoë when she says that she doesn't even know the pain of losing family, since Nemesis was old enough to remember her mother Nyx being captured by Chronos while all Mel did was "fall out of her mother's womb". Melinoë tells her to be quiet. By the next time you talk to her, Nemesis is clearly regretful of what she said.
Nemesis' bitterness is somewhat understandable - a war is going on but she is not allowed to help with the plan because she wasn't born Melinoë. That birthright seem to matter regardless of how clearly awful everything is going.
Heracles is forced to work for the gods to help clear out Ephyra, despite clearly not forgiving them for everything that happened to him during his lifetime. Interacting with him with one of Hera's boons makes him remark on how little it took for Melinoë to earn her respect.
The flashback where Hades first encounters Chronos sitting on his throne is a mix of this and Realism-Induced Horror. Even if you didn't like him, it's quite sad to see Hades, who has spent all of the previous game being self-confident and hard-headed to a fault, suddenly left a meek and stuttering mess before his father, in much the same way that a real-life abuse victim would react upon meeting their abuser again. It really hammers home that, for as massively flawed and dysfunctional the first generation of Olympians are, they became like that due to the actions of people that were even worse. Not helping were most of the other occupants of the House being frozen in time right next to him, hammering in the message that trying to fight Chronos is futile without Hecate's protection. No wonder Hades didn't bother to try facing Chronos in combat and just surrendered himself.
Heracles bitterly remarks to Mel about her wielding Hera's boon, to which the latter replies that it's natural since they're all family. Anyone who knows anything about Heracles' lorenote in particular how Hera was after him his whole life for being the byproduct of Zeus' infidelity and drove him to kill his wife and children in a mindless rage knows how much such a statement would bring out his bitterness and fury.
It doesn't help that Hera herself will tell Melinoë not to help Heracles and will even call him "thick-headed." After everything he's done for the gods, Heracles is still treated like a lapdog by some of them.
The sorry sight of the trashed House of Hades after Chronos' "redecorating" when you reach him for the first time. Zagreus and Dusa's efforts were ravaged by time and the hundreds of hours spent by players earning resources to spruce it up went up in smoke. Time will tell if Zagreus' room was spared...
Hecate tells off Nemesis for leaving her post and pursuing Chronos on her own, going as far to compare her defiance to Eris and saying her mother wouldn't approve of her behavior. Nemesis responds by saying she has no right bringing Nyx into this and that they wouldn't be here if Hecate had done her job as handmaiden and warned the Underworld of an eminent attack. Hecate gets angry with her even further because of that but you can hear it in her voice that Nem's comment did hurt her a lot but is trying to be strong about it.
One commenter mentions that this dialogue a good way of "reminding players how horrible the situation is not just for Meli, but for everyone else around her too."
