diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index df187cd..4216e42 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -1,3 +1,57 @@
+## v0.232.0 — one writer at a time, and a check that can actually run (2026-09-01, R-411/R-408/R-407, R-414, R-412a)
+**MinAgent: 0.129.0** (unchanged)
+
+**THE WALK FOUND THREE MORE ENTRY POINTS THAN THE REPORT DID.** R-411 named one function missing
+`acquireRunning`. Fixing it and then pinning the invariant with an AST walk surfaced **four** in total:
+
+| function | why it mattered |
+|---|---|
+| `RestoreOffboxScratch` | the reported one |
+| `OffboxRestorePrepareFull` | **the second request in the customer's own two-step full restore, and the one that actually shells `restic stats`.** The UI reaches it FIRST, so flagging only the restore would have left the collision reachable by the ordinary path |
+| `RestoreSharesScratch` | R-411's exact shape on the **shares** tier: `unlockStale` + `resticStep`, a live web caller, and its sibling `PlaceSharesRestore` has always taken the flag |
+| `RestoreOffbox` | no production caller today, but the same pattern — flagged so a future caller inherits the guard, not the defect |
+
+`OffsiteInventoryList` is **registered exempt with its reason**: it issues only `restic snapshots
+--json`, measured not to take a lock, and flagging it would make browsing a page refuse during a
+backup for no safety gain.
+
+- **THE REAL DELIVERABLE IS THE WALK, not the acquire.** `offbox_integrity.go:28` asserted *"Every
+  off-site operation takes `acquireRunning`"* since v0.227.0, nothing checked it, and it was **false
+  for months** — the **ninth** instance of this project's most-repeated class. `resticStep`'s licence
+  to run `unlock --remove-all` rests entirely on that sentence, so a false sentence there is a licence
+  to delete a live operation's lock. It is an **AST walk, not `strings.Contains`** — a commented-out
+  call still contains the string. **Red-proofed twice:** removing the acquire fails it naming
+  `RestoreOffboxScratch`; an unregistered fake entry point fails it naming the fake.
+- **R-407 — two sentences corrected in place, not deleted** (R-360's rule). `check` *does* write a lock
+  file; and **`restic stats` takes one too**, which is the fact nobody had and the one that made R-411
+  possible at all.
+- **R-414 — the proof could not run at all on a box with no registered drive.** The determination came
+  out as **neither** "missed" nor "deliberate": R-356's own test comments say the scratch resolver
+  *"still resolves … only the DESTINATION moves"*, so it was **out of scope**, and it was never ruled
+  out on state-only grounds — the one comment about a `systemDataPath` fallback belonged to
+  `PlaceOffsiteRestore`, concerned bulk **userdata**, and R-356 overruled even that. So §6.3's rule
+  applies and **now has a fourth consumer**.
+- **The fallback is SCOPED**, because the two callers ask different questions and one predicate
+  answering both is the R-356 defect itself: a **unit-only** restore may fall back to the system data
+  path (§7 records as `[FACT]` that a driveless app's unit already lives there indefinitely, and that
+  the same-device placement is *"intended, not a defect"*); a **full** restore keeps today's refusal,
+  because it pulls bulk userdata onto a state-only tier.
+- **And the silence ends either way:** a proof that cannot start records `cannot_run` rather than an
+  `Err`, so `last_proof_result` is **never absent** — absent already means *"controller too old"*, and
+  a second meaning on one field is the `StatsKnown` trap one level up. Recorded **without** advancing
+  per-snapshot due-ness, so the app stays retryable once a drive is registered.
+- **A defect I introduced and live validation caught:** the fallback resolved a scratch the cleanup
+  then refused to delete (*"not inside a proof root"* — its accepted-roots list is built from
+  registered drives, which a driveless box has none of). Every nightly proof would have left a copy
+  behind on exactly the boxes the fallback exists for. Fixed, and pinned by a pair of tests — one that
+  the copy IS deleted, one that a path outside every proof root is still **refused**.
+- **R-412 leg 1** — a per-app push whose unit carried no dump and no tar now says so, at `WARN`.
+  Wording only; no guard, and the capture is untouched (08 §8.2). **Leg 2 stays OPEN.**
+- 18 new tests, 1689 → 1707. Red-proofs run and reverted byte-identical for the walk (×2), the
+  driveless verdict, the push wording and the scratch leak.
+
+---
+
 ## v0.231.0 — the box proves its own off-site copy still holds something (2026-08-31, R-87)
 **MinAgent: 0.129.0** (unchanged)
 
diff --git a/CONTEXT.md b/CONTEXT.md
index 027825e..0bc122e 100644
--- a/CONTEXT.md
+++ b/CONTEXT.md
@@ -7,7 +7,63 @@
 >
 > Ask Claude Code: "Please update CONTEXT.md with what we did today"
 
-Last updated: 2026-08-31 (v0.231.0 — R-87: the box proves its own off-site copy still holds something)
+Last updated: 2026-09-01 (v0.232.0 — R-411/R-408/R-407 the lock family, R-414 reachability, R-412a wording)
+
+> **2026-09-01 — v0.232.0. THREE RULINGS.**
+>
+> **1. `restic stats` TAKES A REPOSITORY LOCK, and that is the fact the whole R-411 chain rested on.**
+> Nobody had it. Clean-room measured on demo-hp 2026-08-31: nothing else running, four invocations,
+> the sampler reads `locks=1`. A customer FULL restore shells `stats` in its size probe, so it holds a
+> lock — and until v0.232.0 it held no single-writer flag, so the integrity check was not blocked, ran,
+> met that lock, and `resticStep` removed it with `unlock --remove-all` while logging *"a stale
+> exclusive lock left by a previous crash"*. There was no crash. Also measured, and recorded so the
+> next reader does not re-derive it: `restic check` takes a lock; `restic snapshots` and `restic list`
+> do **not**.
+>
+> **2. THE INVARIANT IS PINNED BY A WALK, NOT BY A COMMENT — and the walk is the deliverable, not the
+> acquire.** `offbox_integrity.go:28` asserted *"Every off-site operation takes `acquireRunning`"* from
+> v0.227.0 and it was false for months, which is the ninth instance of this project's most-repeated
+> class. `TestR408_EveryOffsiteEntryPointTakesTheFlagOrIsRegistered` is an AST pass over
+> `internal/backup` — deliberately not `strings.Contains`, because a commented-out call still contains
+> the string. **On its first run it found three entry points nobody had named**:
+> `OffboxRestorePrepareFull` (the request the customer's UI reaches FIRST, and the one that shells
+> `stats`), `RestoreSharesScratch` (R-411's exact shape on the shares tier, with a live caller) and
+> `RestoreOffbox` (no caller today). All four now take the flag. `OffsiteInventoryList` is registered
+> EXEMPT with its reason — `snapshots` only, measured not to lock, and flagging it would make a page
+> refuse to load during a backup for no safety gain. **Adding a line to `offsiteExempt` is a deliberate
+> act and belongs in the commit that adds it.**
+>
+> **3. R-414's BRANCH, AND THE EVIDENCE FOR IT.** The question was whether `offboxRestoreScratchDir`
+> was MISSED by R-356's unification or EXCLUDED on purpose. **Neither label fits: it was consciously
+> OUT OF SCOPE.** R-356's own commit (`08eb1a6`) says so in its test comments — *"the prepared scratch
+> still resolves to the registered storage path … only the DESTINATION moves, which is precisely what
+> this change is about"* — and every one of its fixtures assumed a registered storage path exists.
+> `demo-felhom`, with `storage_paths: []`, is the case it never had. It was **never ruled out on
+> state-only grounds**: the one comment about a `systemDataPath` fallback belonged to
+> `PlaceOffsiteRestore`, concerned bulk **userdata**, and R-356 deleted it deliberately. This
+> function's own documented exclusion is `cfg.Paths.DataDir` — the **rootfs** — a different filesystem.
+>
+> **So §6.3's `[DESIGN]` rule applies and now has a FOURTH consumer.** But the fallback is **SCOPED**,
+> because the two callers ask different questions and one predicate answering both is the R-356 defect
+> itself: **unit-only** may fall back (§7 records as `[FACT]` that a driveless app's unit already lives
+> on `systemDataPath` indefinitely and that the same-device placement is *"intended, not a defect"*);
+> **full** keeps the R-252 refusal, because it pulls bulk userdata onto a state-only tier (§2.2).
+>
+> **AND THE SILENCE ENDS EITHER WAY.** `ProofResultCannotRun` is recorded through
+> `RecordProofVerdict`, so `last_proof_result` is never ABSENT — absent already means *"controller
+> older than v0.231.0"*, and giving one field two meanings is the `StatsKnown` trap one level up. It
+> does **not** advance per-snapshot due-ness: nothing was proved, and marking one proved would stop the
+> app being retried once a drive is finally registered.
+>
+> **A MISTAKE OF MINE, RECORDED BECAUSE LIVE VALIDATION IS WHAT CAUGHT IT.** The fallback resolved a
+> scratch that `removeProofScratch` then refused to delete — its accepted-roots list is built from
+> REGISTERED drives, and a driveless box has none. Observed on `demo-felhom`: *"refusing to remove …
+> it is not inside a proof root"*, with the copy still on disk. Every nightly proof would have left one
+> behind, on exactly the boxes the fallback exists for. **The unit tests all registered a drive, so
+> none of them could see it.** Fixed, and pinned by a pair — one that the copy IS removed on a
+> driveless box, one that a path outside every proof root is still REFUSED, so the fix is not a
+> widening into uselessness.
+
 
 > **2026-08-31 — v0.231.0. FOUR RULINGS, recorded so none is re-litigated.**
 >
diff --git a/controller/README.md b/controller/README.md
index b611286..0bfc58a 100644
--- a/controller/README.md
+++ b/controller/README.md
@@ -1114,8 +1114,9 @@ restores cleanly, and gives the customer nothing back. Measured on `demo-hp` 202
 | where the expectation comes from | the unit's **own** `compose/docker-compose.yml`, never the live box — the snapshot may predate the app's current shape. Database: `DBServiceNames` (the same discriminator the restore path uses). Volumes: `ParseComposeNamedVolumes`, as an **existence** check, not a name match |
 | outcomes | **three:** pass, fail (readable and empty), and **cannot judge**. An app that legitimately has no database and no named volumes **passes** |
 | repository writes | **none.** `--no-lock`, no `unlockStale`, and the exec seam rather than `resticStep`, so the `unlock --remove-all` escalation is unreachable. Asserted on the argv as a non-effect |
-| guard | takes the single-writer flag itself and **SKIPS rather than waits** (`RestoreOffboxScratch` does not take it — R-408) |
-| scratch | `backups/offsite-proof/<app>` — a **separate root** from the customer's `backups/offsite-restore/`, so the nightly delete can never reach a copy the customer made, and a proof copy can never be offered for placement |
+| guard | takes the single-writer flag itself and **SKIPS rather than waits**. **Since v0.232.0 every off-site entry point takes it** — `RestoreOffboxScratch`, `OffboxRestorePrepareFull`, `RestoreSharesScratch` and `RestoreOffbox` were all missing it (R-411/R-408), and the invariant is now pinned by an AST walk rather than asserted in a comment |
+| scratch | `backups/offsite-proof/<app>` — a **separate root** from the customer's `backups/offsite-restore/`, so the nightly delete can never reach a copy the customer made, and a proof copy can never be offered for placement. **On a box with NO registered data drive it falls back to the system data path** (v0.232.0, R-414), because that is where a driveless app's unit already lives; the customer's FULL restore does not fall back and still refuses |
+| if it cannot run at all | it records **`cannot_run`**, not silence (v0.232.0, R-414). A proof that never started is a standing property of the machine, not a transient failure, so it is written where the hub can read it — `last_proof_result` is never ABSENT, because absent already means *a controller too old to have the feature*. Per-snapshot due-ness is NOT advanced, so the app is retried once a drive is registered |
 | timeout | 10 min (`proofRestoreTimeout`) — ~150x the slowest single app measured |
 | cost, measured on demo-hp | **one app 2.3–4.0 s**, all eight back to back **25 s**, peak scratch = that app's logical size (213 MB largest). The weekly check beside it takes 40.3 s |
 | result | persisted on `settings.OffboxTarget` (`proved_snapshots`, `last_proof_*`) and published on `OffboxReportStatus`. `last_proof_result` absent = **NOT RECORDED** (a pre-0.231.0 controller), never "failed" |