Verify the 0.9.6 integration checkpoint

TODO.md

@@ -66,8 +66,13 @@ target paths and leave a clean release-candidate handoff.
       14 smokes green: audio, campaign, crowd, emergency, focus/radial, movement,
       NPC budget, PLAN verbs, props, scenario content, session shell, timeline,
       tutorial and UI flows. Campaign/tutorial used isolated `XDG_DATA_HOME`.)
-- [-] Re-run the 24-NPC budget smoke and record frame time, mesh count and any
-      texture-memory change; check Web and Desktop HQ if available. (claimed; budget measured, builds next)
+- [x] Re-run the 24-NPC budget smoke and record frame time, mesh count and any
+      texture-memory change; check Web and Desktop HQ if available. (24 avatars,
+      168 meshes, 131,616 triangles, 6.90 ms of 50 ms headless; NPC maps remain
+      0.48 MB. A clean detached worktree at `f5b8ef2` built Linux/Windows/macOS/
+      Web/HQ (`161.5/197.1/148.0/97.8/241.5 MB`); the Web zip has index.html,
+      wasm and pck, the HQ zip has `override.cfg`, and the HQ binary launches
+      headless with the Forward+ override.)
 - [x] Verify save/campaign/tutorial behavior is unchanged by the visual/UI patches.
       (Persistence/session tests remain in the 263-test suite; campaign and tutorial
       smokes passed with isolated `XDG_DATA_HOME`.)
@@ -98,10 +103,13 @@ target paths and leave a clean release-candidate handoff.
 
 ### Release-candidate handoff
 
-- [ ] Update README, architecture, development status, changelog and TODO with the
-      final patch-level results and any remaining gaps.
-- [ ] Tag/version or otherwise freeze `0.9.6` as the integration checkpoint before
-      the `0.10.0` release candidate.
+- [x] Update README, architecture, development status, changelog and TODO with the
+      final patch-level results and any remaining gaps. (README/PLAN/architecture
+      now point at 0.9.6; the changelog and development status record the
+      integration build, performance numbers, judge results and the clean-worktree
+      export rule; `docs/RELEASING.md` documents the ignored-folder trap.)
+- [-] Tag/version or otherwise freeze `0.9.6` as the integration checkpoint before
+      the `0.10.0` release candidate. (claimed; committing and tagging)
 - [ ] Exit: combined build is functionally green, visually reviewed, performance
       measured and ready for the 0.10.0 content-lock/playtest phase.