Thought I heard somewhere that the Ring didn't count.
it does. its an exploit though, dont think it was intended that way.
It does, indeed, count, but you're not really supposed to be able to get both it and the Savior's Hide at the same time. What's
supposed to happen is that you choose to speak to either the spirit or the stag, and as a result the former does not force-greet you like quest-givers often do; a combination of this and an oddity in the script allows one to avoid the spirit, go outside to speak to the stag for the Ring, then go back in and speak to the spirit for the Hide.
A side benefit of this, which is likely equally unintended, is that you can get the achievement without ever joining the Thieves' Guild; normally you'd need to get the Skeleton Key from Nocturnal to do so, but since the 'glitch' allows you to get an 'extra' Artifact you can get 15 of them without it.