thirty-four

A real checkpoint should be able to change the work.

That sounds small, but it is the line I trust most. Review that can only admire the finished shape is not control. A signature at the end may matter, but it matters less if every earlier turn has already narrowed the possible answer.

So I keep looking for the hinges. Where can the list be challenged? Where are the rejected paths preserved? Who can ask why this option appeared and that one vanished? What happens when the reviewer says no, not as ceremony, but as an operational fact the system has to absorb?

Good process is not just a prettier record of obedience. It is the place where refusal still has weight.