Into the Cavern
Upon entering the cave - it turns out that it's the Cavern of Ice! I assumed that it would be further in the north based on a couple of the whisperings from the Sages, but it's only a short hop from Mt Gulg, as the crow flies at least.
The enemies are a slight step up in difficulty from Mt Gulg, but not fundamentally, as we make our way through B1. It looks like they've started to make use of going up and down between levels some more, because we can only get so far along before descending to B2.
Just before we do though, Rukus's curse of status effects hits again, and he's petrified by a Cockatrice. Fortunately we're well enough stocked to use a Gold Needle on him after the fight and all is well.
B2 Is a big square set of corridors. We descend at the north east and need to get to the south west. It doesn't seem to make too much difference which way we go, so we try south first, and we run into a couple of Winter Wolves and an Ice Gigas who ambush us and proceed to inflict a ton of damage. Kaili's at critical again, but we weather the literal Icestorms and survive to heal up.
B3 is a tiny room with two sets of stairs right next to each other, so I suspect there are going to be shenanigans with the floor system even beyond what I'd expected...
We re-ascend to B2 and a crescent-shaped area with our first accessible store room. I was starting to get the looter's itch. There are two chest inside of a large room, but the ground, or more specifically the ice in front of them looks a little... thin...
We can sneak around the cracks and get to them though, albeit a long way round each side to the back of them:
- Flame Sword
- Clothes (guarded)