I see those as three options: C, C++, and Rust. I'd suggest learning C. It's the simplest language of the three, and it's the lingua franca of systems programm

I see those as three options: C, C++, and Rust. I'd suggest learning C. It's the simplest language of the three, and it's the lingua franca of systems programming. You will have tons of resources and examples to work from. And you won't get stuck/frustrated over type system or lifetime issues. You'll always be making progress with C even if it's buggy. While learning C, I highly recommend that you dabble in Rust. Rust has introduced important concepts to programming that will not go away, and just does a lot of things really well, including C integration. You also might appreciate the really easy cross compilation system for embedded development.