[VegetarianOrc]

Summary

• Keep Core updates on origin/main by default and add --latest-tag for the highest stable Core release, preserving explicit --revision overrides.
• Refresh bridge dependency versions and Cargo.lock, then run the existing proto generation task.
• Add poe prepare-release to update to the latest Core tag before preparing the Python release.
• Make release preparation rebuild an existing release branch, publish with an explicit force-with-lease, and reuse an existing open PR.
• Document the workflows and add focused coverage for tag selection, release commits, branch upserts, and concurrent remote changes.

Validation

• poe test -s -n 0 tests/test_prepare_release.py tests/test_update_core.py — 35 passed, including real Cargo lockfile and temporary-local-remote Git tests.
• Targeted Ruff import and formatting checks, mypy, Pyright, and basedpyright passed.
• git diff --check passed.

Release branch behavior

Rerunning preparation for a version intentionally rebuilds its release branch from origin/main, replacing prior release-branch commits. The explicit force-with-lease rejects remote changes made during preparation. Existing open PR descriptions and discussion are preserved.