Will this path prep me for the Adobe Certified Expert exam?

Partially. The paths target shipping skills, not exam trivia, so you will be strong on DI, plugins, service contracts, indexers, MView, and GraphQL, which are 60-70% of the AD0-E724 / AD0-E720 exams. You will still need to drill memorised flags (e.g. --keep-generated, indexer modes), the EAV admin grid wiring, and the legacy Luma checkout flow. Two weeks of Magento U practice exams after this path is the realistic finish line. Honest: certification helps with hiring, not with shipping.