Having received their new mission, Jay and friends are sent out of Pecot castle, with the guards quietly requesting that they not return until their task is complete. Before heading back out into the world, they decide to take a stroll around the north side of Pecot.
Jay meets a fruit vendor just south of Carol’s house. Her apples and oranges are more expensive that one would expect, but they restore HP and MP to all allies when eaten. Carol is glad to be able to go back home after the guards’ temporary occupation. She lets Jay in for a while, but there is little that he can do other than take a peek at her personal belongings.
On the east side of town is another puzzle room, which offers a chance to win 500 gold pieces for anyone willing to pony up 30 GP to get in. Predictably, it’s a little bit harder than the one Jay solved in Kyro, but he manages to make it through with a nice chunk of change to add to his wallet.
The crew is eager to set off for Antignarot’s based to track down the queen. However, their ship was left behind when they disembarked at the castle sewer. Puff manages to find it anchored not too far from Jay’s house. Before they set off on their next journey, they take another stroll around the south side of town to see if anything’s changed since they left.
The lady with the funny accent lets Jay know that the race room near the town entrance is now open, and gives him some tips on his possible opponents. The race itself costs 10 gold pieces, with a chance to win 40, but is rather easy for Jay to win once he takes advantages of the witch slowing down just before the final stretch. One boy waiting at the entrance to the racing grounds says a line that turns out to be both the start of a running gag and oddly prophetic in hindsight.
- Little Boy: "There was a rabbit and a turtle and they raced here and the rabbit was ahead and he thought he'd win and he went to sleep and he lost!"
The shop owner has some new goodies for sale, including a wooden armor set, and some weapons of iron and steel. Jay upgrades his team’s equipment and then heads over to the previously inaccessible east side of town to find a locked building marked as “Condemned.” They get back onto the boat and begin to sail westward, when Jay starts reminiscing about the death of his parents, and the pendant his dad left with him for a memento. He used to hold out hope that his dad was really alive somewhere, although his mother reminded him before she died that the truth wasn’t always going to be pleasant.
The party sails onward to the snow-covered town of Crystia on the other side of the mountains. There is little for them to buy at the shop that they haven’t already seen in other stores, but they do learn that someone had ventured to the Ice Temple to the south for some reason. No one seems to know anything about Queen Esmida, putting the party at a loss as to where to find her.
Aside from the ground in town being perpetually covered in snow, save a few houses and pretty much all the trees, Crystia also has an archery range near the town entrance as a way for travelers to earn money. It costs 50 GP to try to score points by hitting as many quick-moving targets as possible in one minute. Because Jay is unable to use bows and arrows, he enlists Carol to play the mini-game for him, since she does practice archery as well as staff combat.
The house across from the archery range appears to have been abandoned, but it appears to belong to someone who owns a lot of the same robes as everyone else in town. There is also a picture of some unknown girl on the wall.
Jay heads south toward the Ice Temple, which is guarded by slimes, ice flames, red slimes, and axe-wielding Porcs. The ice flames cast Ice 1 and are vulnerable to Carol’s fire magic, while the Porcs are capable of protecting themselves with Defense Up.
They reach the back of the temple and find the ice mage Frost, who is seeking revenge against Antignarot because his fiancé was killed in the Leona attack. He asks the party to take him back to Cymore to take care of some personal business, which they agree to. Frost can use bows like Carol, and his ice magic is good against flame-based enemies, none of which the party has encountered yet. He is somewhat stronger than her, but his magic isn’t quite as strong and his MP pool is more limited, but Jay is forced to bring him along for the moment.
The party sails back to Kyro and heads through the guard house to Cymore. Frost departs into the locked house next to the general store, and Puff decides to keep an eye on him to make sure he doesn’t do anything suspicious. The wind dragon finds it unusually convenient that they were able to find their boat so easily after returning from Pecot Castle. He is also curious about the treasure chest Frost was examining in the temple, and asks Jay to investigate.
But when they return to Kyro to set off on the boat, they’re greeted by a nasty surprise…
Puff’s concerns about the oh-so-convenient boat are well-founded, as it is destroyed in an explosion the moment they approach the pier. The party suspects that either Antignarot or Frost may have done it, but Carol rules Frost out on account of him being in Crystia.
The party returns to Cymore, where Puff tells them that Antignarot set a trap for Frost knowing that he would try to join up with them, and spirited him away to Pecot. Jay hurries back home and looks all over town for clues, but is unable to get any new information from the townspeople. With nothing to go on, they investigate the abandoned shack on the east side of town, which is curiously unlocked.
Inside, Jay finds both Frost and Queen Esmida behind bars, with Antignarot mocking Frost for thinking he could win. Frost takes advantage of Antignarot not paying attention to him by simply jumping over his prison cell bars. Antignarot is dumbfounded, and snatches Esmida away before the others can react or find a way to set her free themselves.
It turns out that the prison cell is above a cave filled with lava. Frost believes that Antignarot may have taken the queen down there, so he rejoins Jay’s party to go after him.
Frost’s presence is much more useful here, as the flame scorpions, flame fiends, and explosives (which are simply recolored Ice Flames) are vulnerable to his Ice magic. The explosives are the most dangerous enemies of the bunch, as they tend to explode after taking enough damage, dealing lots of damage in turn to the entire party.
The lava is too hot for Jay to go anywhere near, but one button that Jay finds floods the cave with water, allowing him to find another switch and a treasure chest buried underneath.
They catch up to Antignarot once again at the end of the cave. Antignarot threatens to toss the Queen into the lava, not realizing that Jay had already drained it. When he realizes that won’t work, he summons a Fire Goblin to take care of them.
Frost’s ice magic helps them dispatch the goblin and its fire magic despite its high HP total. Antignarot absconds with the queen once again, this time to a location that Jay’s party can’t reach now that they don’t have a boat. When the party leaves Pecot in search of another one, they are approached by an unexpected visitor…
