The Cold Realm Within: The mallet instruments and plucked strings convey a sense of cold in your environment. Contrary to the following track, this track doesn’t feel solitary and it seems to convey the small town, but even though it’s abandoned, somehow there is something else there.
Alone: The use of high piano, strings, and mallets without a foundational bass layer holding it up the whole time is really great musical imagery for loneliness in my opinion. It’s like an upside-down pyramid, where there is significant instability, which is kind of how one’s mental state feels when they experience significant loneliness.
Snow Buried Village: The light and bouncy feel of this track seems to contrast with the loneliness from the previous track. This maybe is conveying an early area in the game where the main character may be fairly defenseless, but the area feels safe enough to explore.
Footprints in the Drifts: The mallets you are using are getting lower in pitch and darker in timbre which I think is a nice artistic choice as the main character is climbing up the mountain.
Shades on the Trail: The pulsing strings with syncopated war drums and a march-like snare is a formula for a Fire Emblem (or other JRPG) battle track and you created one here that I would absolutely believe you if you told me it came from a big game like that!
Failure: The i-bVII-i cadence works very nicely in this desolate sounding sequence for a game over theme. Creative idea to include this!
To Claim Oneself: The cello and double bass ostinato that comes in part way is so great at creating tension with the pulsing motion and straying from the tonic by a half step before coming back. I’m a fan of the use of choir to create an elevated heroic theme.
End of Self Discovery: The story comes full circle. With the boss absorbed now, it feels like there was a lot that had happened, but some of the same coldness still exists. Similar to Snow Buried Village, there is a sense of lightness in this track, but it also has a trudging feel as well, as if maybe there is another mountain still left to climb.
Overall: I think your game idea is a creative interpretation of the theme and you executed the cold-realm vibes very nicely! Great use of strings, mallets, choir, and percussion throughout to aurally describe the scene and the story. Well done and thank you for sharing!