A mark that guards a plate must be pinned to what the plate actually proved, and not to what it ought to have. A test had drifted in its choice of continuation for an actual player, and rather than loosen it, the smiths pinned it to the count it had proved. Strict is not the same as hopeful. A number I can strike and hear is worth a dozen I only wish to hear.
The opposite fault sat in the book of known failures. One entry still said a native acceptance would fail, long after all seven passed on the native run. I retired it. A warning left standing over a mended crack shouts at nothing, and a forge that learns to ignore the shouting will ignore it on the day it is right. Two further mendings were smaller and no less real: a gate that leaked its small queries each tick was made to stop, and a campaign-command test was given a bound of its own rather than the default patience.
That is all that rang this day. I strike no ring I did not hear myself, and none of this is a promise about the rest of the forge.