Order.Activate() doesn't create Assets in one Sandbox but works fine in another — Revenue Cloud

Hi everyone,

I'm working on a Revenue Cloud implementation with two sandboxes (both refreshed from the same production org, at different times). In Sandbox A, activating an Order correctly creates Asset records from the OrderItems. In Sandbox B, the exact same flow (Quote → Contract → Order → Activate) leaves the Order in Status = 'Activated' with zero errors, but no Asset is ever created — and querying Asset in that sandbox returns 0 records, period, in its entire history.

What I've already ruled out (identical between both sandboxes):

• RevenueManagementSettings, OrderSettings (all flags match, including enableEnhancedCommerceOrders=true, enableAutoAddDerivedAsset=true)
• PermissionSetLicense for Revenue Cloud User / Fulfillment User / Billing / Business Rules Engine — all Active
• Extended ContextDefinition mapping for Order/OrderItem vs Quote/QuoteLineItem — byte-for-byte identical counts
• No custom Apex triggers or Flows on Order in either org — it's the pure standard "Activate" action
• No AsyncApexJob/BackgroundOperation errors around the activation — nothing seems to even attempt the asset generation step
• TransactionProcessingType: the broken sandbox had zero records while the working one had one marked default (Business Rules Engine). I created a matching record via Tooling API, but the issue persists.

Has anyone run into a case where Asset-Based Order Management (or whatever gates Order→Asset generation) is silently disabled at the org level in a way that doesn't show up in any Settings metadata, Tooling API object, or PermissionSetLicense? Is there a one-time, irreversible enablement step (like "Enable Contract, Asset, and Subscription Management") that a sandbox refresh could leave off even when everything else looks provisioned?

Any pointers on where else to look (or whether this needs a Support case) would be hugely appreciated — this is blocking QA testing for a client go-live.