Right now, you could be unknowingly standing on top of a mountain.

Though it sounds like a fantastical feature of Jules Verne's Journey to The Center of the Earth, subterranean mountains are real, albeit different from any novelist's envisaged landscape. This strange range is part of the layered structure of our planet, rippling along a geologic boundary some 410 miles down. It contains tremendous peaks, with some that may tower even higher than the mighty Mount Everest.

Now, scientists have got their best look yet at these subsurface mountains using the seismic waves from multiple big earthquakes. Published recently in Science, their analysis suggests that the peaks are not just tall, but surprisingly rugged—a discovery that could provide clues to why