On the southwestern corner of Iceland, just to the south of the city of Reykjavik, is a small peninsula

that shuts out into the cold waters of the North Atlantic. It's known as the Alphains

Peninsula, and although few people live there, the local government recently decided to

connect the small stretch of land to the town of Garda Bear, a suburb of Reykjavik.

In 2015, however, construction on the new road was brought to a halt,

standing in their way was a massive rock, 12 feet high and weighing in estimated 70 tons.

According to Highway Department employee Peter Matthiasson, the rock has presented an

unusual challenge to his department's construction project.

Now you have to understand something about Iceland. Much of the region is a vast

expanse of sparse grass and large volcanic rock formations, the ground boils with geysers and

springs, and the sky seems to be eternally grey and cloudy, so it's important to recognize that

there are hundreds, maybe thousands of these volcanic stones along the construction route.

So what could possibly be so important about this one particular stone? Why would the Highway

Department go to such lengths, even covering the expense of hiring a crane, just to move one

stone to a safer location? The stone they say is inhabited. It is, as it has been for many

long centuries, home to the Holdafok, the hidden people. They are the size and shape of humans,

and live in much the same way. Except, of course, they're invisible.

I'm Aaron Manke, and this is lore.

In the late 1930s, another road construction project in the same area of Iceland was planned to

cut straight through a hill known as Elfhole. From the beginning, though, the project was met with

challenges. First, the money for the project ran out, and when funding resumed a decade later,

construction encountered even more challenges. The machines that were used to cut through the hill

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