Monospace ASCII art in non verbatim formatting on github

Question

I am trying to:

• form an ASCII art directory structure (similar to this fastlane snippet) in markdown (specifically on github comments). But it has to have hyperlinks in it, so, the usual `verbatim` will not work. ∴ I am looking for some way to format normal markdown text in the monospace font-family and give explicit spaces and explicit line breaks to preserve the structure.

I have found solutions for:

• monospace: the html tag teletype tt or code works
• explicit space: the non-breaking space &nbps; seems good alternate
  • to insert it directly as  : use alt + 255 on windows
  • for records: 	 doesn't work

---

Remains:

• how to elegantly give explicit line breaks
• (any other solution/advice/suggestion is welcome too)

Where do I stand:

• Using <tt>...</tt> per line works in preserving line breaks, but due to the inherent inline nature it doesnt render good
• Using <tt>...</tt> at block level (similar to recommended usage of details tag) gives a super awesome rendering, but doesnt provide any way to insert single line breaks (i think t's called soft break?) ...
• ... none work among these: / <enter> ; <br/> ; 
 ; 
 (CRLF). I found these via Whitespace_character article referred in mailtrap blog on nbsp; and this SO answer
• ... 2 <enters> provides 2 line breaks in render too

Sources of trials:

<tt>/</tt>
<tt>├── fastlane</tt>
<tt>└── fastlane</tt>
<tt>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;├── [changelog]</tt>
<tt>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;│&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;├ ...</tt>
<tt>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;│&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;├ ...</tt>

[changelog]: https://example.com

<tt>

/

├── fastlane \
└── fastlane <br/>
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;├── [changelog] &NewLine;
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;│&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;├ ... &#13;&#10;
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;│&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;├ ...

&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;│&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;├ ...

</tt>

[changelog]: https://example.com

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Addendum:

• Duplicate search: monospace but not verbatim
• I was reading the GitHub flavored Markdown gfm/#example-141 and that example obviously didn't work in comments, so... I dont't know what spec sheet do github comments follow.
• Some useful pages on this topic: w3s/html_entities ; html-escape-chars ; named-chars via html.com ;