"Yes, lord Odin," I answered unsteadily. "I was traveling over that icy waste in my flying ship. A storm caught me and flung me far north, toward this strange land which I could not even see until I was hurled into it."
"So the outland peoples have been learning science?" Odin asked thoughtfully. "It must be so, if they can build flying craft."
"Yes, and I am one of the scientists of my people," I said. "Yet I cannot understand this strange land. It cannot be seen from outside. It is warm compared with the polar cold outside, and it seems flooded with some mysterious force."
"If you cannot understand these things," Odin rumbled, "then the science of your outland peoples cannot be deep as our ancient one."
I was more stunned than ever. The Aesir seemed utterly without modern scientific tools, weapons and instruments, yet their ruler was calmly deprecating the science of the modern world.
"I cannot understand you, lord Odin!" I burst out. "Asgard, all the Aesir, and the Jotuns have been deemed but legend for many centuries. Yet in this hidden land I find you have the names of the old gods, and have called your city Asgard. Most of all, I do not understand why you speak of the science of my race as though you knew a much deeper science. I have seen no evidences of scientific knowledge in this land at all!"
"Outlander, who call yourself Jarl Keith," Odin replied, "we Aesir are men, not gods. But we have lived for many centuries in Asgard, and many legends may have risen about us in the outer world."
"You've lived here for centuries?" I gasped incredulously. "Do you mean that you are immortal?"
"Not immortal. We can be killed by war, accident or starvation. But we do not grow old, and neither do we sicken or die of disease. We do possess an ancient science, deeper and different than your outland science.
"But because it once brought us disaster, we prefer not to encourage research in it, nor use it in our everyday lives. We Aesir were the first civilized race of Earth. For we grew to civilization in the place where life itself first evolved — beneath the crust of Earth."