I still have a hard time believing that essentially all of this cosmic mess from season 1 to season 8 happened in the span of a year, which also means that thousands upon thousands of officers are getting promoted faster and higher than NuKirk
Actually from the in-game perspective its just one officer, your character. The rest of the captains you see commanding other starships? They're good captains, but they're only ordinary captains.
If you played the remastered Borg/Undine FEs, there's a conversation where your character meets Tuvok for the first time and say, "I've read all about you and your adventures on Voyager". And Tuvok replies, "I too know about you and your meteoric rise through the ranks."