That is how AOLServer used to be, and all the other scripting languages developed as Apache plugins, back in the 2000's .com wave, like mod_perl and PHP.
Maybe scripting language was overused down the road? i.e. to use it for everything, and use them like a compiled language(ruby in rails, php framework, django,etc) that made things slow?
point here is that to restrict script languages to glue logic for the most part, and always remember to use ffi for heavy lifting, not sure how to balance both yet.
That is why PHP eventually got a JIT, initially thanks to Facebook experiments compiling to C++, and later the JIT proving being capable to generate similar performance.
The problem was exactly that overused, without JIT/AOT in the box, with many people shying away from writing native extensions, instead adding more boxes.
The difference between doing JavaScript in node with native extensions in 2023, and Perl/TCL with native extensions in 2000, is exactly that, a JIT.
The main reason why server-side stuff is slow is poor use of the database. Doing e.g. nested loops in a compiled language uses way less CPU than a scripting language, but it should be done in the DB in the first place.
That is how AOLServer used to be, and all the other scripting languages developed as Apache plugins, back in the 2000's .com wave, like mod_perl and PHP.