New laptop with windows 7 via 8 downgrade, format and install windows 10, not activating

Question

Just got a new laptop with Windows 7 (via 8 downgrade rights) installed on it. I reserved a Windows 10 upgrade then installed Windows 10 via the media creation tool.

So I skipped doing an upgrade to Windows 10 from 7.

Now Windows 10 says it cannot be activated. When I run slmgr.vbs /ato I'm told "The activation server determined the specified product key is blocked."

Is my only recourse to install 7/8 and then upgrade from that? Seems really convoluted.