The thing in his hand was indeed a ring—the one he had made with his own hands in Forsaken Prison.
Although his main goal at the time had been to craft a key that would take him to Forsaken Prison, Fu Qian hadn't slacked off when it came to his artistic and technical ambitions.
To fully embody the theme of a mechanical remake, he had put quite a bit of effort into creating this complex structure, which kept running like a clock.
That was right. Fu Qian was fiddling with it for a very simple reason. He'd just mentioned a good way to deal with Etched Wisdom: carry a timekeeping device with you.
But honestly, considering how quickly his clothes wore out, a wristwatch or pocket watch simply wasn't reliable enough.
So Fu Qian had immediately thought to make a small adjustment to the ring in his hand and integrate that function into it.
There was no need to actually carve a watch face into it. He only needed some way to indicate the time, so it wasn't all that difficult.
And now, it was more or less finished. Though even if Professor Lanaia held it right before her eyes, she wouldn't notice.
"Is this one of your research projects?"
The latter had frowned almost as soon as she took a look. As she voiced her question, she seemed to finally realize that Professor Fu was cut from the same cloth as those other troublesome people.
"Yes."
Fu Qian admitted it with a proud look.
"...So you're planning to use this thing to find A Kai's whereabouts?"
Somewhat unable to stand that expression, Lanaia frowned even harder and tentatively guessed what Fu Qian was up to.
"No. It might look impressive, but it's just a clock."
To her surprise, Fu