Can’t get into safe mode

Hi! I’ve got a pretty complicated issue going on! A few days ago, after having absolutely no issues leading up to this, I opened my MacBook to the grey screen with the folder & question mark. Upon getting it into recovery mode, I was able to determine that the SSD/hard drive was not being recognized (but the disk was showing up). I’m assuming the SSD or whatever it is has stopped working or for whatever reason is no longer being recognized. So I got a 1tb external hard drive. Got it back into recovery mode- partitioned the hard drive to guid & ran first aid. I then tried installing the Mac OS (Ventura), which then said the hard drive wasn’t formatted correctly, so I found a support question that said to put it into APFS. Once I did that, I was able to download the Mac OS. Finally thought everything was good to go as it finally booted up to the set up screen (like when you first get your device as all my stuff was gone 🥲). But after selecting language & connecting WiFi, I got an error message saying something to the extent of “the Mac OS needs to update and the computer can’t be used until then”. What I’ve found from other support posts is that the issue more than likely has to do with the firmware for the Touch Bar, and many people were able to fix this issue by booting into safe mode and installing the Mac OS from there. So my issue is now that when I try to get into safe mode, it simply won’t. It just brings the MacBook to the set up screen- which prompts the Mac OS update issue. I’m assuming I can’t get it into safe mode due to it not being set up. It’s a 2016 (can’t remember if it’s early or late) MacBook Pro and it’s intel based (so using left shift to try to boot to safe mode). I just bought this MacBook used off of eBay in August 😅😭