Hmm…
That is a weird, but good discovery.
Consider this line of code:
my_objects = bpy.context.scene.objects
print(my_objects)
This line, of course, works when not rendering, but fails when your press F12. But your lines of code for link and unlink do certainly work. You would think that if that the context were truly “None” that no further navigation down the RNA path would be possible. But I guess that is not the case. Very odd indeed…
I guess access to methods still work, but access to properties are denied.
Thanks again, that definitely helps!