Maybe worth venturing into the embedded land? There are some pretty cool Rust embedded projects (e.g. embassy) which are sort of best of both worlds. You get to do low level hardware tinkering (which arguably requires a systems programming language) and you get a sort of batteries included environment where you can use all the nice Rust high level features (memory safety, async, etc).

Easier to get started with than OSdev and less gruesome legacy hardware details to study to get stuff done.

Next time I need some lights blinking or actuators actuating I'm gonna do it with Rust and rp2040+.