I don't cook enough (and never steak) for you to assign me much weight, but FWIW I've had a (lighter, spun) cast iron skillet for 8ish years. I followed a seasoning procedure available online that involves (IIRC) 3 rounds of applying thin coats of flaxseed oil and leaving it in an oven at a fairly high temp.

This process went fine, but I always had to baby the pan (had to be very careful cleaning it with said chainmail, very careful with what/how I cooked in it) and had to re-do the initial seasoning several times when it got too troublesome.

This process would leave the pan at a dark brown, and for a while I blamed this on not removing rust well enough before seasoning or not babying it well enough for it to build up to a ~normal black coat.

At some point during the early pandemic I tired of this. I decided to do something similar on the stovetop where I could observe/iterate better. Apply a coat, wait for it to stop smoking, and repeat until it was black. (plus a few for good luck; I didn't keep track; this took maybe dozens of rounds?)

I've had a much better time since then. The most ~babying I've done is applying a few fresh coats if I don't use it for a while or water doesn't bead when I rinse it.