diff --git a/.github/pull_request_template.md b/.github/pull_request_template.md
index c7dae42e..ae0cd4e1 100644
--- a/.github/pull_request_template.md
+++ b/.github/pull_request_template.md
@@ -36,6 +36,7 @@
 - [ ] If dependencies or a lockfile changed: `npm run check:lock` passes, the root `package-lock.json` is synchronized, and `npm audit --omit=dev --audit-level=high` reports no vulnerabilities
 - [ ] If a subpackage changed (such as `dsh/dsh-nmg`): `npm run verify:packages` passes (frozen-lockfile install + build), and `pnpm-lock.yaml`/the lockfile matches `package.json`
 - [ ] For documentation changes, `npm run docs:check` was run; decision/design changes follow the doc-maintenance rules
+- [ ] **Every doc owner this change touches is named here**, with the file that was added or edited: decision record (`docs/decisions/`), design (`docs/design/`), experiment (`docs/experiments/`), postmortem (`docs/postmortem/`), guide (`docs/guides/`) — or `none`, with the reason. A behaviour change with no owner named is a defect, not an omission: the next reader has nowhere to look. "Updated docs" without a path does not satisfy this item.
 - [ ] `## Not verified` is filled in (write `None.` if nothing remains); non-trivial changes include a decision record
 - [ ] New code methods stay within the cyclomatic-complexity threshold (CodeFactor / `npm run complexity:gate`)
 - [ ] No reproducible build artifacts are committed: do not check in `dist/`, `dsh/dsh-nmg/lib/`, `src/prompts/nmg-prompts.generated.ts`, or `.nmg-search-scope` (see `docs/decisions/rejected/2026-09-02-track-build-artifacts-in-git.md`)
diff --git a/docs/decisions/implemented/2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.md b/docs/decisions/implemented/2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.md
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..74b5bb27
--- /dev/null
+++ b/docs/decisions/implemented/2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.md
@@ -0,0 +1,94 @@
+# An accept takes no compare-and-swap
+
+[简体中文](2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.zh-CN.md) · [Terms](2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.terms.yaml)
+
+**Status:** implemented
+**Approved:** explicit
+
+## Problem
+
+Measured from a clean network against the deployed build, one user's write path answers in 2.6 s at
+concurrency 1 and in **51-106 s** at concurrency 4, where 7 of 24 requests were killed at the
+120 s invocation ceiling; at concurrency 16, 5 of 32 connections never completed. A killed request
+does not cost a score, it voids the attempt: the harness probes `/health` first and stops.
+
+The cause was structural, not a slow dependency. Every accept for one user read the manifest,
+computed a new one and wrote it back under an ETag compare-and-swap; a loser re-read and recomputed,
+up to twelve times, and each attempt re-read and re-exported a partition of up to 8 MiB. The only
+thing the accept wrote there was the pending count.
+
+## Decision
+
+**The write path appends; it does not contend.**
+
+1. **An accept writes one thing**: its log entry, under a key derived from its own request hash,
+   which no rival can collide with. It reads the manifest once, for the two facts the log cannot
+   answer - the generation, and the receipt of a request that was already folded.
+2. **The pending count is derived, not written.** Its only consumer is an operator reading
+   `/capacity`, which now lists a bounded prefix and reports `pending_capped` when the bound was
+   reached. Nothing on the read path trusts a zero any more: two gates (`pendingForSearch` and
+   `fusePendingRecords`) returned early on `pendingCount === 0`, and both are gone.
+3. **The fold is scheduled, not counted.** Roughly one accept in `FOLD_TRIGGER` (overridable with
+   `NMG_FOLD_EVERY`) attempts a fold; the fold lists the log first and does nothing when fewer than
+   a batch is waiting, so a wasted attempt costs one listing while a missed backlog would hide data.
+4. **An accept embeds its own messages, and the fold reuses those vectors.** The document text for
+   this path is `[day ]statement` - the service never supplies `previous_turn` - so it is known
+   before any partition is opened. Accept embeds under `NMG_ACCEPT_EMBED_MS` (8 s) and stores the
+   vectors in the entry with the index identity that produced them; the fold seeds its client from
+   them and applies storage only. Losing the budget is not an error: the entry is written without
+   vectors and the fold embeds as before.
+5. **Every long operation is bounded.** The fold has `NMG_FOLD_BUDGET_MS` (20 s) and is skipped, not
+   failed, past it; the search loop stops at `NMG_SEARCH_DEADLINE_MS` (60 s) and answers with
+   `partial: true`; the fold's embedding backfill takes one batch of 32 (`maxBatches: 1`), matching
+   the search path, where it used to embed a whole partition's backlog in a single request.
+
+## Evidence
+
+| measurement                               | value                                                                                          |
+| ----------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
+| Add p50, concurrency 1                    | 2.6 s (max 21.9 s: one fold)                                                                   |
+| Add p50, concurrency 2                    | 3.6 s (max 41.2 s: one fold)                                                                   |
+| Add p50, concurrency 4                    | 51.6-106 s, 7 of 24 killed at 120 s                                                            |
+| connection failures at 16                 | 5 of 32                                                                                        |
+| provider calls per Add, after this change | at most **1**, even when the Add triggers a fold (24 sequential Adds, fold proven to have run) |
+| provider retry budget                     | 3 attempts, only for 429/5xx; a timeout is not retried                                         |
+
+## What this does and does not establish
+
+- Not verified against a deployed build. Every number above is the before-state; the after-state
+  needs one real run.
+- It does not remove contention from the fold itself: two concurrent folds on one user still meet at
+  the manifest CAS and are retried. It removes it from the path that runs on **every** accept, which
+  is where the amplification was.
+- A count that lags can only cause an extra fold attempt, never a missed one: a stale-high count
+  costs a listing, and the read path no longer trusts a zero.
+
+## Alternatives considered
+
+- **Keep the count and retry harder.** That is the measured failure: twelve attempts each redoing
+  megabyte-scale work.
+- **Shard the counter (AWS's "write sharding")**, or a **G-Counter / PN-Counter**. Sharding divides
+  contention by the shard count and keeps it; a grow-only counter cannot express a backlog that
+  shrinks, and a PN-Counter's decrement cannot be reconciled with a log without ceasing to be
+  mergeable. Both were assessed as strictly worse than deriving the number.
+- **Put the counter in KV** (1 GB, unused on this platform) - the industry-shaped answer, since
+  object storage is not a queue. Not taken because the only consumer is one operator reading
+  `/capacity`, and a listing answers it on demand.
+- **Alibaba Batch API for the embedding.** Supported by `text-embedding-v4` at half price, but it is
+  asynchronous with a poll to collect results and this runtime has no timer; the poll would have to
+  be carried by later requests. Rejected for the serving path, retained as the right tool for an
+  offline re-embed.
+- **Fire the embedding after the response (waitUntil).** Our entry never receives an execution
+  context - `edgeone-entry.mjs` documents that deliberately - so there is no continuation to
+  register.
+
+## Consequences
+
+- An accept is one PUT of a few KB. A burst no longer amplifies into retries.
+- `/capacity` costs a listing, which is why the operator path pays it and the request path does not.
+- **Rolling the code back now requires draining the log first.** An older deployment short-circuits
+  on `pendingCount === 0`, and this deployment no longer maintains that count, so it could read a
+  log with entries as empty. `/admin/fold` answers 409 until it is empty, which is the guard.
+- A record whose inline embedding exceeded its budget is embedded twice (once abandoned, once in the
+  fold). That is the only duplicate spend this introduces, and it happens only when the provider is
+  slower than 8 s.
diff --git a/docs/decisions/implemented/2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.terms.yaml b/docs/decisions/implemented/2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.terms.yaml
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..c9c1a952
--- /dev/null
+++ b/docs/decisions/implemented/2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.terms.yaml
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+version: 2
+terms: []
+references: []
diff --git a/docs/decisions/implemented/2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.zh-CN.md b/docs/decisions/implemented/2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.zh-CN.md
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..8b4ab28b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/docs/decisions/implemented/2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.zh-CN.md
@@ -0,0 +1,54 @@
+# accept 不参与比较交换
+
+[English](2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.md) · [Terms](2026-10-29-accept-without-cas.terms.yaml)
+
+**Status:** implemented
+**Approved:** explicit
+
+## 问题
+
+从干净网络对已部署构建实测：单用户在并发 1 时写入 2.6 秒，并发 4 时 **51-106 秒**，24 次请求里 7 次被 120 秒的调用上限杀掉；并发 16 时 32 次连接里 5 次根本没建立。被杀不是丢一分，而是整次评测作废——比赛方先探 `/health`，失败就停。
+
+成因是结构性的，不是某个依赖慢。同一个用户的每次 accept 都要读 manifest、算新版本、带 ETag 写回；输家重读重算，最多十二次，而每次都要重新读写一个最多 8 MiB 的分区。而 accept 在 manifest 上写的**只有那个计数**。
+
+## 决策
+
+**写路径只追加，不争用。**
+
+1. **accept 只写一样东西**：它自己的日志条目，键由请求哈希派生，没有对手能撞上。manifest 只读一次，为了拿日志答不了的两件事——代际，以及已折叠请求的回执。
+2. **计数是派生的，不是写出来的。** 它唯一的消费者是看 `/capacity` 的运维，现在按有界前缀列举，并在触到上限时标 `pending_capped`。读路径不再信任零：`pendingForSearch` 与 `fusePendingRecords` 两处"计数为 0 就返回"的短路都已删除。
+3. **折叠按排程触发，不再依赖计数。** 约每 `FOLD_TRIGGER` 次 accept 试一次（`NMG_FOLD_EVERY` 可覆盖）；折叠先列举，不足一批就什么都不做——浪费一次尝试只花一次列举，漏掉积压才会藏数据。
+4. **accept 自己嵌自己这批消息，折叠复用这些向量。** 这条路径的文档文本是 `[日期 ]statement`（服务从不提供 `previous_turn`），所以在打开任何分区之前就已确定。accept 在 `NMG_ACCEPT_EMBED_MS`（8 秒）内嵌入并把向量与产生它的索引身份一起写进条目；折叠用它们播种客户端，只做存储。预算用尽不算错误：条目照写，折叠照旧嵌入。
+5. **每个长操作都有界。** 折叠有 `NMG_FOLD_BUDGET_MS`（20 秒），超了跳过而不是失败；检索循环在 `NMG_SEARCH_DEADLINE_MS`（60 秒）停止并返回 `partial: true`；折叠的嵌入回填只做一批 32 条（`maxBatches: 1`），与检索路径一致——它原本会在一次请求里嵌完整个分区的积压。
+
+## 证据
+
+| 测量                            | 值                                                                          |
+| ------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
+| 并发 1 Add p50                  | 2.6 s（max 21.9 s，一次折叠）                                               |
+| 并发 2 Add p50                  | 3.6 s（max 41.2 s，一次折叠）                                               |
+| 并发 4 Add p50                  | 51.6-106 s，24 次里 7 次被杀                                                |
+| 并发 16 连接失败                | 32 次里 5 次                                                                |
+| 本次改动后每次 Add 的提供商调用 | **至多 1 次**，即使这次 Add 触发了折叠（24 次顺序 Add，且证明折叠确实跑过） |
+| 提供商重试预算                  | 3 次尝试，只对 429/5xx；超时不重试                                          |
+
+## 这确立了什么、没有确立什么
+
+- **没有在已部署构建上验证。** 上面每个数字都是改动前；改动后需要一次真实运行。
+- 它没有消除**折叠自身**的争用：同一用户两个并发折叠仍会在 manifest 上相遇并被重试。它消除的是**每次 accept 都会走的那条路**上的争用，而放大正是发生在那里。
+- 计数滞后只会导致多折一次，绝不会导致漏折：偏高只花一次列举，而读路径不再信任零。
+
+## 考虑过的替代方案
+
+- **保留计数、加大重试**：这就是被测量的失败形态，十二次尝试每次都重做 MB 级工作。
+- **分片计数（AWS 的 write sharding）或 G-Counter / PN-Counter**：分片只是把争用除以片数，仍然存在；只增计数器表达不了会缩小的积压，而 PN 的减法无法与日志核对共存，一旦核对就不再可合并。两者都劣于"派生"。
+- **把计数放 KV**（本平台 1 GB、当前未用）——与业界同形的答案，因为对象存储本来不是队列。没有采纳的理由：唯一消费者是一个人偶尔看 `/capacity`，一次列举就能答。
+- **用阿里云 Batch API 做嵌入**：`text-embedding-v4` 支持、半价，但它是异步且需要轮询取结果，而本运行时没有定时触发；轮询只能由后续请求承担。服务路径上否决，离线全库重嵌仍然适用。
+- **响应之后再嵌（waitUntil）**：我们的入口从不接收执行上下文（`edgeone-entry.mjs` 里明确不传），因此没有可注册的续体。
+
+## 后果
+
+- 一次 accept 就是几 KB 的一次 PUT。突发不再放大成重试。
+- `/capacity` 要花一次列举——所以由运维路径付，请求路径不付。
+- **现在回滚代码必须先排空日志。** 旧部署用 `pendingCount === 0` 短路，而本部署不再维护该计数，于是它可能把有内容的日志读成空。守卫是 `/admin/fold`：未清空就返回 409。
+- 一次 accept 的内联嵌入若超预算，那条记录会被嵌两次（一次被放弃、一次在折叠里）。这是本次引入的唯一重复花费，且只在提供商慢于 8 秒时发生。