diff --git a/docs/proposals/ner-entity-linking.md b/docs/proposals/ner-entity-linking.md
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..16980c2d9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/docs/proposals/ner-entity-linking.md
@@ -0,0 +1,107 @@
+# Proposal: NER-Based Entity Link Extraction
+
+## Problem
+
+A production brain with 165K+ pages and a custom schema pack (30 types, 8 link verbs) has only 32% entity link coverage — meaning 68% of entities have no typed links at all. The schema pack defines rich relationship verbs (`works_at`, `founded`, `invested_in`, `advises`, etc.) but the data isn't populated because typed link extraction only works when frontmatter explicitly declares the relationship.
+
+Body text is full of implicit relationships: "Alice is the CEO of Acme Corp", "Bob invested in Acme's Series A", "Alice previously worked at BigCo". None of these become typed links today.
+
+### Scale of Impact
+
+| Metric | Value |
+|--------|-------|
+| Total pages | ~165,000 |
+| Entity link coverage | ~32% |
+| Entities with zero typed links | ~68% |
+| Schema verbs defined but underused | 8 |
+
+## Proposed Solution
+
+### NER Extraction Using the Brain's Own Gazetteer
+
+Rather than adding an external NER model dependency, use the brain's own entity pages as the gazetteer:
+
+1. **Build entity index**: Collect all person and company page titles + aliases
+2. **Scan page body text** for co-occurrences of entities with relationship signals
+3. **Extract typed links** based on context clues:
+   - "CEO of Acme" → `works_at` (with role annotation)
+   - "founded Acme" → `founded`
+   - "invested in Acme" → `invested_in`
+   - "advisor to Acme" → `advises`
+   - "acquired by BigCo" → `acquired_by`
+4. **Create links** with confidence scores; only auto-create above threshold
+
+### CLI Interface
+
+```bash
+# Extract typed links from all pages
+gbrain extract links --ner
+
+# Extract from specific page types only
+gbrain extract links --ner --type meeting,company
+
+# Dry run to preview extractions
+gbrain extract links --ner --dry-run
+
+# Only extract specific verb types
+gbrain extract links --ner --verbs works_at,founded
+
+# Set confidence threshold (default: 0.7)
+gbrain extract links --ner --threshold 0.8
+```
+
+### Relationship Pattern Matching
+
+The extraction engine should recognize common patterns per verb type:
+
+| Verb | Patterns |
+|------|----------|
+| `works_at` | "CEO of X", "engineer at X", "joined X", "works at X" |
+| `founded` | "founded X", "co-founded X", "started X in 2020" |
+| `invested_in` | "invested in X", "led X's Series A", "backed X" |
+| `advises` | "advisor to X", "advises X", "on X's board" |
+| `acquired_by` | "acquired by X", "bought by X", "X acquired" |
+
+### Schema Pack Integration
+
+Schema packs should be able to declare custom extraction patterns per verb:
+
+```yaml
+verbs:
+  works_at:
+    extraction_patterns:
+      - "{person} is (the )?(CEO|CTO|COO|VP|engineer|designer) (of|at) {company}"
+      - "{person} (joined|works at|leads) {company}"
+```
+
+## Agent Onboarding
+
+### Features Detection
+
+`gbrain features` should detect low link coverage:
+
+```
+⚠ Entity link coverage: 32%
+  Your schema defines 8 relationship verbs but 68% of entities have no typed links.
+  Run `gbrain extract links --ner` to extract relationships from page text.
+```
+
+### Migration Prompt
+
+```
+Entity link coverage is 32%.
+Run `gbrain extract links --ner` to extract typed links from page text? [y/N]
+```
+
+## Evidence
+
+The production brain has a fully installed schema pack with 30 types and 8 link verbs. The infrastructure for typed links is complete — the data just isn't there because no automated extraction exists. Meeting notes, company profiles, and person pages all contain relationship information in natural language that could be extracted.
+
+## Risks & Mitigations
+
+| Risk | Mitigation |
+|------|------------|
+| False positive relationships | Confidence threshold, dry-run mode, manual review option |
+| Ambiguous entity names | Prefer longer/more specific matches, use page context |
+| Pattern fragility | Schema-declared patterns allow customization per deployment |
+| Performance on large brains | Batch processing, incremental (only scan modified pages) |
diff --git a/src/core/cycle/synthesize.ts b/src/core/cycle/synthesize.ts
index 9828a4f3a..4cbccbf3d 100644
--- a/src/core/cycle/synthesize.ts
+++ b/src/core/cycle/synthesize.ts
@@ -110,6 +110,22 @@ function warnUnknownModelOnce(model: string): void {
   );
 }
 
+// ── Surrogate-safe string slicing ─────────────────────────────────────
+
+/**
+ * Slice a string at `index` without splitting a UTF-16 surrogate pair.
+ * If `index` lands between a high and low surrogate, back up by one so
+ * the pair stays intact in the left half.
+ */
+function safeSliceEnd(index: number, str: string): number {
+  if (index <= 0 || index >= str.length) return index;
+  const code = str.charCodeAt(index - 1);
+  // If the char just before the cut is a high surrogate (D800–DBFF),
+  // the cut would orphan it. Back up one.
+  if (code >= 0xD800 && code <= 0xDBFF) return index - 1;
+  return index;
+}
+
 // ── Hash-deterministic transcript chunker (D9) ────────────────────────
 
 /**
@@ -178,8 +194,9 @@ function findBoundary(text: string, maxChars: number, searchStart: number): numb
   // Tier 3: any newline.
   const nlIdx = window.lastIndexOf('\n');
   if (nlIdx >= 0) return searchStart + nlIdx;
-  // No boundary fits; hard-split at maxChars (deterministic).
-  return maxChars;
+  // No boundary fits; hard-split at maxChars (deterministic),
+  // but avoid splitting a UTF-16 surrogate pair.
+  return safeSliceEnd(maxChars, text);
 }
 
 /**
@@ -659,7 +676,7 @@ export async function judgeSignificance(
   // doesn't need the full body; the opening + closing sections are usually
   // representative of significance.
   const trimmed = t.content.length > 8000
-    ? t.content.slice(0, 4000) + '\n[...truncated...]\n' + t.content.slice(-4000)
+    ? t.content.slice(0, safeSliceEnd(4000, t.content)) + '\n[...truncated...]\n' + t.content.slice(safeSliceEnd(t.content.length - 4000, t.content))
     : t.content;
 
   const sys = `You judge whether a conversation transcript is worth synthesizing into a personal knowledge brain.