a) you absolutely need performance, so a GC is out of question b) you don't need absolute performance
In case a) I don't think there are better solutions than C In case b) you wouldn't use C, to begin with. C#, Go, Java are ok.
in particular, and i've read that writing kernels isn't feasible in Go. it appears not to be an issue of performance. something about the runtime prevents writing kernels altogether.
like the linked article says
https://drewdevault.com/2019/03/25/Rust-is-not-a-good-C-repl...
rust has a lot of features (generics, etc.) aside and apart from the memory management strategy.
i'm also unaware of a procedural language that has the feature stability of C or Go as well as the ability to write kernels or embedded code with the memory safety of rust.
currently wondering how easy it'd be to tack rust's memory model onto another language, alef in particular.
C is only relevant as long as we will have UNIX and POSIX around.