I can't even get past the statues. I get to the room up to the north and then there's nowhere else for me to go. It's rough. The game has been nothing but enjoyable until that point, but having to walk around a dark room with no music, nigh unavoidable encounters, and losing 30-100% of my HP purely based on RNG is extremely furstrating
I'll have to take a look at this section to see how I could improve it, but the idea is that you have to run from the statues (Both in the overworld and in battle) until you find a certain gem in a metal chest, that gem makes dealing with the statues a piece of cake.
On the room to the north, you take a right and then go up, there will be a abandoned building in there, go inside and open the metal chest, which gives the gem and opens up the rest of the second area.