Recent CS Graduate here, looking to do better!

Hello everyone, hope you all are doing well. I am a recent CS graduate from a third world country. I currently have 2 Q1 journal publications to my name, one as first author, the other as the second. I was wondering, how do people actually learn exponentially, how do they end up going from Q1 publications to higher, something like A or A* ranked papers?

I might be hated for this, but one of the reason I want to pursue research more is because I cannot afford higher education unless I do so, and one of the popular ways to prove I am worthy of funding is by having high ranked journal papers to my name.

Now, a paper of such calibre is generally not doable solo (unless someone's a genius, which I am not, I believe lol), for which I need to be looking for labs to work in, work together, learn, and try to apply to these prestigious journals. How do I look for these labs, or more specifically, where do I look for labs to get to work for them, even if its voluntary work? I am trying via LinkedIn but not having much luck. I also need suggestions on how to approach them for work.

I have spoken to my professor about the lab run by my school, I did not get a direct response, rather got the opportunity to collaborate with my professor solo, and he asked me to come up with an idea from my own thoughts (which he prompted that we'd iterate and eventually work on it to get published). As I mentioned, this might not lead to a high ranked publication, but could help me learn the fundamentals of independent research/ further teach me how research is truly done in bigger schools. But I fear, without actually learning/getting the true essence of what research actually feels like, this might not result in a good enough journal publication.

I am in need of guidance, how do I climb up? How do I do better? What am I missing? As a fresh graduate, with every passing day the hole in my resume gets bigger. I don't want to be a sitting duck in this economy, but without the rules laid out, I am struggling to play either way