Consider a special marking on numbers that is used when finishing counting. This replaces both ordinals and cardinals.
Thus
... twenty-two, twenty-three, twenty-four, twenty-five, twenty-six.[end-morpheme].
Possible origins: markers for perfect or perfective aspects, or maybe reduced verbs (a structure expressing the idea that now, 'twenty six (pieces have been) counted').
Another source could be as simple as 'and' or a word like 'last'. And finally, maybe congruence with the noun class of the counted things only appear on the final number, and thus serves to signal completed counting.
Finally, some kind of superlative marking could work? Potentially, 'last' could already have a superlative marker in it (consider how English 'last' ends in what probably is the superlative morpheme, much like how the un-cognate word 'sist', with the same meaning, has the superlative morpheme in Swedish) - so a reduced 'last' could bring with it the superlative morpheme anyway.
But without bringing 'last' into it, maybe the final number is considered the greatest of the bunch, and just therefore it gets the superlative marker. This would be pretty neat.
Keep in mind that not all languages have comparatives and superlatives, though.
Finally, some kind of superlative marking could work? Potentially, 'last' could already have a superlative marker in it (consider how English 'last' ends in what probably is the superlative morpheme, much like how the un-cognate word 'sist', with the same meaning, has the superlative morpheme in Swedish) - so a reduced 'last' could bring with it the superlative morpheme anyway.
But without bringing 'last' into it, maybe the final number is considered the greatest of the bunch, and just therefore it gets the superlative marker. This would be pretty neat.
Keep in mind that not all languages have comparatives and superlatives, though.
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