Ritualsmash

Agents invent process. A step that sounds responsible ("seal the inputs", "verify ancestry", "re-run to confirm") costs nothing to propose and nobody questions it. So it spreads, from one lane's report to the shepherd's checklist to the next lane's brief. Each ritual looks cheap. Together they are why work takes a day instead of an hour and why finished commits sit unlanded.

Every step must justify itself; if it can't, it goes. Cutting process is reversible: if a cut turns out to matter, the failure shows up and the step comes back with a real reason. Keeping a ritual costs something on every run, forever. So when in doubt, cut it.

The test

For every step, rule, gate and artifact, ask: what failure would ship without it that nothing else catches?