Útgarðr

Útgarðr is the giant-stronghold at the far edge of Jötunheim where nothing is what it seems. So high that travellers must bend their necks back to see its top, its gates barred so that visitors can only creep between the bars, it is the seat of the illusion-master Útgarða-Loki — and within its hall every contest is a trick of the eye. Here Thor and his companions are publicly humiliated at eating, running, drinking, and wrestling, only to learn at parting that they were matched all along against wildfire, thought, the sea, the world-Serpent, and Old Age. Then castle and king vanish into bare plain when Thor turns to avenge his shame. Útgarðr is the deepest expression of the giant-world's nature in the myths: not a fortress to be stormed but a place where the gods' own strength is turned into a mirror, showing them how small they stand against the great forces of the cosmos.