Can easily be massively improved- double unification glyphs is the easiest, which changes the ~cycles from 3 cycles/rot*8 rots*3 atoms*4 matches*6 samples=1728 to 4 cycles/rot*4 rots*3 atoms*4 matches*6 samples=1152 but the other costs probably puts it at ~1.5k. I'm pretty sure the good solves start at ~1k, so 1.5k is still way too much and it'd be a lot of work to do.

The fastest algorithm I could find was to convert each atom into a 6-long stick of fire/salt, which should be able to hit a cycle count of ~350 including setup (6*6+3=39 atoms*8 cycles/atom=312). Here's hoping someone else made it, but efficiently routing the salts into the stick-makers was beyond my geometry skills.