Misleading ERR_REQUIRE_CYCLE_MODULE when attempting to import from module if module was never installed

[MaxKessler5]

Bug Report Checklist

• I have read and agree to Mocha's Code of Conduct and Contributing Guidelines
• I have searched for related issues and issues with the faq label, but none matched my issue.
• I have 'smoke tested' the code to be tested by running it outside the real test suite to get a better sense of whether the problem is in the code under test, my usage of Mocha, or Mocha itself.
• I want to provide a PR to resolve this

Expected

I forgot to npm install a library, and tried to test with Mocha. I expected an error about the missing module.

Actual

The error claims the missing module is a cyclical import. It is not cyclical, it is just missing

Minimal, Reproducible Example

Here is a gist that reproduces the problem using bash: https://gist.github.com/MaxKessler5/9d53a143df67ce1cd4dff9e9f03d2db4

The contents:

npm init -y
sed -i 's/"type": "commonjs"/"type": "module"/' package.json
echo "// Entry point for the application" > index.js
echo "import { cloneDeep } from "lodash-es";" >> index.js
sed -i 's/"test":.*/"test": "mocha"/' package.json
npm install mocha
mkdir test
echo "import "../index.js";" > test/test.js
npm test > output.txt

Versions

$ npx mocha --version
11.1.0

node_modules/.bin/mocha --version
(I'm on windows, not sure how to do this one)

node --version
v22.12.0

Additional Info

No response

[JoshuaKGoldberg]

👍 thanks for the report! Confirmed, I can reproduce this locally. I pushed up my repro here: https://github.com/JoshuaKGoldberg/repros/tree/mocha-missing-module-cyclic

On macOS with Node <=22.11.0:

 Exception during run: Error [ERR_MODULE_NOT_FOUND]: Cannot find package 'lodash-es' imported from /Users/josh/repos/repros/index.js
    at packageResolve (node:internal/modules/esm/resolve:842:9)
    at moduleResolve (node:internal/modules/esm/resolve:915:18)
    at defaultResolve (node:internal/modules/esm/resolve:1132:11)
    at ModuleLoader.defaultResolve (node:internal/modules/esm/loader:557:12)
    at ModuleLoader.resolve (node:internal/modules/esm/loader:526:25)
    at ModuleLoader.getModuleJob (node:internal/modules/esm/loader:249:38)
    at ModuleJob._link (node:internal/modules/esm/module_job:126:49) {
  code: 'ERR_MODULE_NOT_FOUND'
}

On macOS with Node >=22.12.0:

 Exception during run: Error [ERR_REQUIRE_CYCLE_MODULE]: Cannot require() ES Module /Users/josh/repos/repros/test/test.js in a cycle. (from /Users/josh/repos/repros/node_modules/mocha/lib/nodejs/esm-utils.js)
    at ModuleLoader.importSyncForRequire (node:internal/modules/esm/loader:315:15)
    at loadESMFromCJS (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1414:24)
    at Module._compile (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1547:5)
    at Object..js (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1677:16)
    at Module.load (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1318:32)
    at Function._load (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1128:12)
    at TracingChannel.traceSync (node:diagnostics_channel:322:14)
    at wrapModuleLoad (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:219:24)
    at Module.require (node:internal/modules/cjs/loader:1340:12)
    at require (node:internal/modules/helpers:138:16)
    at exports.requireOrImport (/Users/josh/repos/repros/node_modules/mocha/lib/nodejs/esm-utils.js:53:16)
    at async exports.loadFilesAsync (/Users/josh/repos/repros/node_modules/mocha/lib/nodejs/esm-utils.js:100:20)
    at async singleRun (/Users/josh/repos/repros/node_modules/mocha/lib/cli/run-helpers.js:162:3)
    at async exports.handler (/Users/josh/repos/repros/node_modules/mocha/lib/cli/run.js:375:5) {
  code: 'ERR_REQUIRE_CYCLE_MODULE'
}

ERR_REQUIRE_CYCLE_MODULE is kind of a weird error here. Agreed this is a bug.

I did a quick search for the error in the Node issue tracker and found:

• Wrong ERR_REQUIRE_CYCLE_MODULE for require(esm) nodejs/node#55516
• Regression after updating to 22.12.0 (getting ERR_REQUIRE_CYCLE_MODULE) nodejs/node#56127

nodejs/node#55516 looks like it might have links to a similar bug that was fixed in other libraries. Investigation required.