@Zombie, thank you for reading and reviewing. There's a lot for me to chew on here. I'll admit that taking criticism is always harder than accepting praise, but I try to do that with as much grace as I can muster.

I'm aware of the flaws, many of them have been pointed out before, but you bring up some that I myself overlooked, like my tendency to introduce things only to drop them quickly for a long time or forever. This is mostly the parts I discovery wrote with only a general idea of what direction I was heading in. It's much harder to keep track of these things in the typical fanfiction posting format, where a chapter is published once it's finished. Basically the flaws of an amateur, something I try to get better at.

Then there are some things that were brought up in this story, but will be resolved in the sequel, like Hermione's subplot. Still others we're gonna disagree on as a matter of individual preference. I admit to being heavily influenced by Silens and Swimdraconian, but I do try to not like, totally copy what they do. Problem (for me) is that Renegade Cause and Circular Reasoning are so well known in the fandom that it's hard not to draw a comparison in my disfavor.

But regardless, many thanks for your insights.

 

>Renegade Cause and Circular Reasoning are so well known in the fandom that it's hard not to draw a comparison in my disfavor.
Essentially.
By starting years ago and being dead, they simply are what they are, and have become a reference point of sorts. I find them both to be great works, with their requisite flaws, but it's totally unfounded to observe other explorations of Harry as a noir hero as a copy of those works. We're literally on a forum where everyone likes stories about the characters using dark magic and blurring the lines between good and evil because the source material was written so antithetically that overgrown children use Voldemort as a modern sort of Satan- he's just pure evil. It's not important what he does or why, he's just evil and anything compared to him is evil. While a work with shades of gray does not stand out among the very best fics in the community, a black and white work would be no different from the canon.

In the interest of not repeating what has already been said, I would call attention to the chosen point of departure.
Other reviewers have said they can or can't see Harry responding the way he did to the events of the graveyard. The truth of the matter is, canon Harry did have a reaction to the sudden death of Cedric and the return of Voldemort- he had bad dreams and started getting angsty, in short. The prior experiences of his life, his expectations of the future, and some central je ne sais quoi innate to who he is made him respond the way he did to those events taking place. In order for him to respond differently, I would think something slightly different would have had to happen. Was this the result of horcruxes working differently in your interpretation, which caused a human horcrux to behave differently?

I admit I tend to interpret things in a way that makes the source material make more sense.
Consider the fact that Dumbledore left Harry on a door step on a cold November evening. As it was, it's just a minor detail to be ignored, possibly even a minor mistake to be readily forgiven. Making the wizard cruelly negligent as an explanation seems to make this moment less nonsensical, but the rest of the story suffers as a result(If you've read a book before, you realize Dumbledore represents Christ and now there's a disconnect). My preferred interpretation is that Dumbledore already knew the Dursleys were home, and Hagrid likely used a warming charm, which I'm to understand is pretty basic. It's something that was left out of the canon, but you can't include every last detail. I realize my style of analysis is irreconcilable with 'wizards are dumb' fics, but it's essentially the only way I can enjoy a work of fiction. By contrast, I propose that HPMOR could only have been written out of contempt for the source material.
With my interpretation of Dumbledore's character, I have an easier time understanding his forgiveness toward Harry's use of a killing curse directed at him, though I would still imagine he would be more stern in trying to get Harry off the 'Greater Good' train, which he seems to board himself later in the work when he forces Harry to forget about Snape revealing the prophecy to Voldemort. I don't understand a Dumbledore who can be sorry about using the mind arts on a boy in the beginning of the book, then fine with it later, even if he had a better reason for it.
One of the most basic parts of the old warlock's character that the DH tries to communicate is that he deeply regrets his previous devotion to the Greater Good, which Harry parallels in his devotion to the Lesser Evil. In this, you and Silens appear to have a significantly better grasp of Dumbledore's character than the fics that understood him to be evil, which almost invariably gave him the same utilitarian philosophy on which he did a 180 in the source material.

Pacing doesn't really register with me, I'd probably have to read a lot of fics with really bad pacing to start figuring out why that's supposed to annoy me, so I don't have any complaints in that department.

I don't think anyone else has mentioned the recycling of Sally-Anne Perks, which I enjoyed well enough, as a sort of tie between Hogwarts in the world of children and the werewolf underground in the world of men, making the universe seem better connected, while plot points and characters in CR felt highly tangential. I suppose that could be intentional in a fic that seems to be about deteriorating mental health.

Ultimately 4/5, maybe a bit higher conditionally on my more favorable interpretations being correct. I'm keeping a lookout for the sequel's completion.