Well, I'm glad that you were able to proceed without the same error reoccurring.
As for the "freeze" issue, this is something that tends to happen with RPG Maker if you do indeed stand around for a long time and have other things going on in the background on your computer. It's not specific to that area or our game... it's more like a memory issue on lower-powered computers.
Hopefully you can continue to proceed through the game. It might be a little bit jittery in performance but I'm afraid that is all stuff outside our control (the game engine itself or your computer's spec)