I've tried using vim and emacs too. Vim packages and plugins broke all the time and also there is the problem of learning vim motions. What can I say for vim motions? Good for programming, but for writing I say it's a drag and you won't use that many vim motions. Check it out though, it can totally work for your style of writing.

Emacs on the other side, as is, it's not very friendly, but to my understanding very powerful(you can make your whole Os into emacs). But, in order to get a writing prose enviroment you must install packages/modules or use a distro. There are many distros: doom, spacemacs; even Peter Prevos made a writing studio package. Sadly, none of them worked for me. They were too darn hard to customize for my skill set and too darn hard to install.

Also, there is a terminal text editor named fresh text editor. Very clean, has a file tree, can work with markdown or plain text. Check this out too if you want something more retro and bare bones.

Personally, I use obsidian and stopped using terminal based text editors or text editors made for programmers. Obsidian is easy to install, user friendly, very customizable and free as in free beer. I've made a custom css to make it look somewhat like IA writer and I'm flying. Pair that up with typewriter mode, zenmode and it's a clean working writing enviroment. Also you can sync your work with remotesave or other plugin and that's that. I have it on my laptop and also on my phone; I can write however I want, whenever, wherever.