Practically all of Cytus II's main characters have at least some emotional baggage to deal with. The story itself also really likes putting them through the wringer.
Unmarked spoilers below, as per the Spoilers Off policy
- PAFF aka Aroma White's entire life in general becomes progressively more depressing the more you think about it, especially once you go through her DLC chapter.
- The realization that, before meeting Neko, Aroma might have had only one friend in a girl named Iris Baker, who she drifted apart from after they graduated from The Academy. When she runs away, the first person she attempts to contact is Iris, only to discover that she doesn't have any information on her, leading Aroma to break down further under the belief that all her memories of her only friend might have been completely false.
- Then there's the reveal later on that Helena, her own sister, was the reason Aroma couldn't contact Iris anymore, all because Helena was afraid of letting Aroma out of her sight.
- Just before her career as an idol was about to start, she ended up getting into a violent car accident that left her in a coma for months. When she wakes up, she finds herself unable to recall nearly everything from her past and is told that, as a result of the damage done to her brain, she could run the risk of losing all her memories all over again. And when she returns to The Academy, she becomes a target for bullies, who proceed to spread the rumor that she was faking her amnesia for the sake of publicity. The kicker is that one of the people who instigated the rumor was Clara, the class representative of Aroma's class who was one of the few students seemingly friendly to her when Aroma returned.
- It later turns out that Clara was actually legitimately friends Aroma but grew jealous of her because of her many talents and because her now-boyfriend Daniel was attracted to her. She's clearly torn-up over what she had done in the past. In a tragic twist of fate, Aroma was close to meeting them again, only to run off with Neko when they crossed paths with Vicky. Their attempt to visit Clara ends up being what outs Aroma's whereabouts to the rest of Node 08.
Clara: Every time I see her, I always feel like I'm so ordinary, so distasteful... Especially after she left, I hate myself for doing all those despicable things to her. I used to like her so much too, but the more I like you, the more I... - After collapsing on stage, the first thing she does upon waking up is sob as she was terrified of losing her memories all over again. And then afterwards she suddenly begins recalling memories that go against what she's been told about her life, which means the memories she was so terrified of losing may have been based on lies.
- When coupled with the PAFF logs, all of Aroma's interactions with Noah are a mix of this and Nightmare Fuel. Aroma suffers from social anxiety that grows worse whenever she has to talk to men, but she was seemingly comfortable talking with Noah, who she viewed as a surrogate father. Then Noah proceeded to break that trust completely by sexually assaulting her, completely re-contextualizing all their prior friendly interactions.
- After Neko takes Aroma in, Aroma is reminded of her sister Helena, which causes her to breakdown sobbing. It's clear that Aroma's relationship with her sister has grown strained and complicated, a stark contrast to the little girl who walked all the way from home to visit her sister in her workplace.
- The realization that, before meeting Neko, Aroma might have had only one friend in a girl named Iris Baker, who she drifted apart from after they graduated from The Academy. When she runs away, the first person she attempts to contact is Iris, only to discover that she doesn't have any information on her, leading Aroma to break down further under the belief that all her memories of her only friend might have been completely false.
- The situation with Simon's sister Shannon is heartbreaking. As a result of an unspecified incident, Shannon's mind was fractured, leaving her without a portion of her memories and a mental condition called "virtual Internet PTSD". In practice, this means she's no longer able to communicate with the outside world, and even the slightest glimpse of a simulation (in a world where holographic technology is the norm) causes her to suffer panic attacks. Only Simon is able to communicate with her in any capacity due to the music he plays, but he's forced to wear his helmet as the sight of his face also causes panic attacks. When Sherry sees Shannon and has the situation explained to her, she's driven to tears.
- The death of Joe's dog Zark at the hands of Hunter hits not just because of the senseless killing of an animal but because of Zark's ties to Joe's uncle and father-figure Saxon. To just hammer it home, the log showing Zark's death contains audio samples for both the gunshot and Zark whimpering. Not helping matters is the following log, which consists of just a single photograph of Zark, and the log after that, which has Joe drinking himself into a stupor while sobbing.
- Ivy finally succeeds in waking Vanessa up, and you think it'll be a heartwarming reunion, only for Vanessa to declare her desire to destroy humankind. That kind android we saw in Ivy's flashbacks is gone. This is only kept from being a full-blown "Shaggy Dog" Story by the fact that Vanessa's current mindset was the result of her memories being corrupted, giving Ivy the chance to turn Vanessa's perspective around. However, it edges back into more depressing territory from the way Ivy says that she no longer wishes to harm humans. It seems to imply that Vanessa's first words brought about a kind of Heel Realization.
- The reveal that the original Aroma is Dead All Along. After previous logs provided some Hope Spot that she could have woken up to some capacity and was being kept somewhere, it turns out she only had a month left to live.
- Turns out Helena was complicit in robbing Kaori of her identity to turn her into a copy of her sister. While this also places her in a darker light, one can't help but understand her reasoning for permitting it once they see it for themselves. She had just been told that her sister, her only family of blood and a teenager with her whole life ahead of her, had only a month left to live. Most would become desperate for any solution no matter how dark, and even then, it's made very clear that she did so very reluctantly with a lot of strong-arming on Noah's part. Then, in a bitter turn of irony, Helena proceeds to essentially rob the new Aroma of any life outside of her career just because she's so afraid of losing her again.
- The Miku DLC ends on a really bittersweet note. After finally gaining sentience, Miku 2.3.9. accepts that she is just a stepping stone for a better idol and allows herself to fade from existence, but she does so doing what she loves: singing to the world. The stunt needed to get Miku onto the stage for her final performance also ends up costing her creator, Furuhata, his job, though he seems to have found peace with fulfilling his creation's last request.
- The reason why Miku's creator, Itsuki Furuhata, is such a cold and abrasive Workaholic shows just how unfair the setting is. He and his ill wife sought to help the ailing poor who had no financial means to obtain proper treatment, and to do so set up a non-profit clinic. Thanks to Furuhata's technological expertise, the clinic was able to develop revolutionary healthcare technology. Their dreams of helping the less fortunate were then completely dashed by the ARC, who shut down their operations because Furuhata's technology would take business away from the pharmaceutical companies. As a consequence of the shut down, a number of their patients ended up dying, including a boy Furuhata had come to view as a surrogate son.
- Hayato used to have two motives for searching for Kaori: his friendship with her, and their adoptive mother, "Grandma" Feng Huang, who wanted to see her again while she was still alive. Unfortunately, he failed to uncover her whereabouts before Feng's health took a turn for the worst, and she fell into a coma following a stroke. With help from the Kyuu Hou Kai's medical technology, he manages to deliver one final message to her: Hayato decides to let Feng die happy, falsely telling her that he did manage to find Kaori, using perfume and voice recordings to fake her presence (as Feng had gone blind from the brain damage). Feng went out with a smile, believing Hayato's lie. PAFF herself is also driven to tears upon visiting Feng's grave and realizing that she had forgotten about her, despite how much she loved her.
- Dear God, Crystal PuNK OS Log 33! Xenon and Cherry share one final moment at Cherry's hospital bed after the failure in her life support system causes her to slowly die, Cherry saying she finally knows what it means to let go of the past. Her last request to Xenon is for him to sing Still to her before her hand goes limp, leaving behind the bear charm Xenon got for her birthday all those years ago in his hand. Hard cut to the new title screen
without any credits, showing the final shot with an acoustic remix of Still. As if to hammer the loss even further, everyone is gone from Crystal PuNK's song select screen and the lights are darkened. - Everyone's reactions to Cherry's death is heart-wrenching. Xenon utterly trashes Cherry's room in a fit of rage before disappearing completely, ROBO_Head blames himself for not being able to restore the power in time, and Neko decides to leave Node 03 entirely, unable to handle her death.
- For someone who was close to eradicating the human race, Vanessa is nothing but a tragic figure. Besides the trauma she has endured and the way the ARC used her as nothing more than a glorified battery, it in retrospect becomes clear that she never had a choice in her course of action upon being reawakened. When Ivy comes close to finally reaching out to her, Vanessa is clearly in pain from having her body controlled by the protocol compelling her to kill humans. Then Ivy is gunned down in front of her by the very humans Ivy was vouching for. Upon being defeated, Vanessa breaks down, asking the player and Aroma to kill her so she can be with Ivy again.
- Should Aroma be forced to perform a Heroic Sacrifice, the "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue will show Helena huddled on the couch sobbing, unable to move on from her sister basically dying a second time. The bottle of alcohol and pills on the table next to her makes it clear what she's been doing.
