Since noone else answered yet, I will contribute some additional findings I noticed:
When just having a basic “Test Workflow” Trigger Node in front of my pinecone node (1:1 similar code), everything works as expected.
However, when I have a Classifier Node in front of it, suddenly there is no more result. I also tried adding different “placeholder” nodes between the classifier and the pinecone node (like e.g. a “Wait” or a “Set” Node), which worked once (!), but stopped working afterwards immediately again.
I tried reproducing it, but I cannot identify any clear structure on when it works, and when it doesnt, with the exception that it almost never seems to work after a classifier node
This leads me to the conclusion, that this must be some kind of n8n bug.
Having the exact same Node in two different places, without any input from the previous node, and once it works, once it does not, seems like there must be something under the hood that is responsible for that.
Not sure how I can tag this as a bug, would be nice if someone could help me out,