Questions, References, and Riddles.

{Author's Note}

THE INSPIRATION! IT KEEPS FLOWING! I HAVE UNLIMITED POWER!

Unfortunately, unlimited inspiration doesn't mean unlimited stamina and ability to focus. For half the day I've been writing, and the other half I've been trying to figure out why I'm so freaking exhausted. I think its FROM all the writing, but eh. A lot of people suffer for their art, so I will too.

On another note, I have something I want to mention: the reason I think Kevin works as an MC and a lot of people like him, while a lot of other people don't. You see, Kevin is based on me, as I've said before, and I hate a lot of story tropes. There is one story trope I see too many times in too many stories, though, that takes many forms, but always pisses me off:

1) Person A attacks for a stupid reason - Usually a misunderstanding or as a "test" for Person B

2) Person A stops attacking - Usually due to realizing their mistake or seeing what they were "testing" the Person B for.

3) Person B forgives Person A and doesn't do anything to retaliate any further.

Kevin breaks this trope by not only not suddenly forgiving the person for attacking him, but by actively continuing to beat the shit out of them until he thinks they've suffered enough for their stupidity. There is no "I accept your apology for trying to kill me over a misunderstanding you created," only "I'm going to kill you because you're too stupid to allow to live." You don't get to apologize for your mistakes; you get to pay for them.

This is turning into a rant, so I'll just point out one more that you may have noticed back in the Happiness Village chapters: If you put an entire village/city/country in his way and expect him to play nice because of the civilians, he absolutely won't. He has sealing power, so he can slaughter his way through thousands of civilians without permanently killing them, and leave you with the knowledge that the psychological scarring of your people is your fault because you put them in the way of his freedom.

Just felt like airing all that out in an author's note. This was mainly for me, but I hope a few of you can sympathize with my hatred of these tropes.

ON WITH THE STORY!

***

"I would like to make a request before we get into the trial," Page 65537 began, lowering herself until she was as close to eye level with Kevin as she could get. "Could you PLEASE do something about the Monster Lord slowly burning down the library."

It was obvious to anyone with eyes that despite giving the excuse that she was only using Ilias' religious texts as kindling, Alice wasn't paying attention to how far the fire was spreading as she cooked her fifth potato over it. In a few minutes, it would likely reach one of the fully-stocked bookcases, leading to a chain of events that would end in the entire room being engulfed in flames.

Needless to say, none of the three page monsters were enthusiastic about that possibility.

The Eevee nodded in understanding. "Sure, as long as you don't mind me slipping into something more fitting for a test of intelligence."

Perverse grins made their way onto the faces of all three book monsters, with Page 65537 being the only one to school her features. "Go ahead. I hope you don't mind if we watch, though."

"I wouldn't recommend it if you don't want to go blind," the boy shrugged.

The boss monster had strong enough instincts to turn away at the warning, but her subordinates were too curious and/or perverted to follow the advice. Both of them subsequently cried out shock as the Eevee erupted into light bright enough to make them go blind for the next five minutes. By the time the light died down, in the boy's place was his Espeon form, complete with suit, tie, and glasses.

"Now, on to mitigate the damages my companion is likely to cause," he stated.

Page 65537's jaw dropped upon seeing him. As a monster who had lived for many years, she could tell how powerful the monster boy was at a glance. In his base form, he didn't seem to be anything special, other than a faint trace of power sealed deep within him. Now, though, he was exuding a magical presence that almost made her drop her professional mindset in favor of dragging him into a book and feeding off of him for the rest of his natural life.

What stopped her from following through with that stray line of thought was him looking over his shoulder, his eyes meeting hers, and shaking his head slightly. She remembered the threat he'd given Page 257, and quickly concluded that it would be in her best interest to kill that fantasy with extreme prejudice and wait calmly for him to return.

She may be horny, but she wasn't stupid.

As for the teen, he approached the lamia and tapped her on the shoulder. "Excuse me, Alice, but I'm going to have to ask you to either extinguish that flame, or apply a magical effect to it that will prevent it from spreading to the rest of the library."

She didn't bother to look over at him, but did reply. "Give me three reasons why I should do either."

"Easy," the Espeon nodded. "1) You are terrible at cooking, to the point where there is a fifty percent chance that you somehow made each of the potatoes you've cooked completely inedible; 2) If you don't bring the fire under control within the next five minutes, I will use my full strength to forcefully eject you from the library; and 3) Your subordinates over there need books to live, so burning down the library would be the same as maliciously evicting them from the home you assigned them to."

It was no secret between them that while the Monster Lord was powerful and possessed a well of knowledge, if her culinary skills were rated on a scale of one to ten they would somehow break through into the negatives. If they weren't eating premade food from a restaurant or inn, Kevin was always the one cooking their meals. Alice could be trusted with simple tasks like boiling water half the time, but the other half she ended up burning whatever she tried to heat up.

Including the water.

Alice knew all too well the risks of her baking the potatoes, as she'd already thrown two of them into the bonfire due to them being turned into black husks, but it was a sacrifice she was willing to make. The threat of the teenager forcefully removing her from the building using his Espeon form was one she tossed back and forth in her head, debating on whether he'd actually be able to do it without destroying the library in the process. The final point he'd made, though, about her hurting her subordinates, whom she had given this position in the first place, was just the guilt trip needed to reign in her pyromaniacal plans for the basement library.

"Fine," she sighed in disappointment. "But I'm not going to stop baking my potatoes." Using her masterful control of the elements, she set up a magical field around herself and the bonfire that prevented the fire from spreading any further, but also allowed the smoke to escape. By the time the duo left, the room would definitely need to be aired out.

"Thank you," Kevin said before returning to the waiting trio of monsters. "Objective accomplished."

Page 65537 smiled. "I overheard, and appreciate your efforts to keep this library in one piece. Although, I must ask: why does the Monster Lord allow you to insult and threaten her like that?"

"We have an understanding between us. She is, if you'll pardon my use of vulgar language, a bitchy glutton, while in my base form I can be best described as an apathetic asshole. Both of us acknowledge these facts about each other and ourselves, and have deemed it unnecessary for either of us to lash out at the other for pointing out any obvious flaws. There have been some petty potshots that do step over the line, like the magical girl incident, but we make sure not to escalate beyond what could be reasonably called 'light bullying,'" the boy explained.

"I see." As tempted as she was to pry even further into the relationship between her boss and the teenage monster with enough power to rival the Four Spirits, the book monster felt that she had wasted enough time with that one question alone. "With that out of the way, I will now explain to you the conditions of the trial.

"Each of the three of us will think of three questions. They can be anything from riddles to questions about the world, but the answers to each will have definite answers. There will be no impossible questions, or questions whose answers would be impossible for you to know, as that would defeat the point of having a fair trial. At the end of the nine questions, you will have one final question decided upon by all three of us, totaling up to ten questions in all. If you get two questions wrong, you will fail and have to give up on reading the book forever.

"Do you accept these terms?"

"Of course," Kevin smiled, eager for a test of his intelligence.

"Then we shall start with Page 17," the boss monster gestured to her subordinate.

Being the youngest and having read the least number of books out of the three of them, Page 17 wasn't entirely certain at first what kind of questions she should ask. She didn't let her uncertainty show, though, and came up with the perfect questions to make him slip up. After all, they'd been used in a comedy she'd browsed through a few years ago, and the outcome was hilarious.

"What is your name?" she questioned; her expression still blank.

The boy raised an eyebrow. "Kevin."

"What is your quest?"

"To read the contents of the book [Four Animists and their Sources]."

"What…is the airspeed velocity of an unladen harpy?" Page 17 asked, now showing a triumphant smirk.

"That depends." Kevin's reply quickly wiped the smile off of her face. "Are we talking about one from the Ilias continent, the Sentora continent, or Hellgondo?"

It was at that moment that Page 17 remembered what part this set of questions had in the story, which up until now she'd only vaguely remembered. Fortunately for her, there was no Gorge of Eternal Peril for her to be cast into; but that was a cold comfort when even she wasn't aware of what the answer was.

"I…don't know," she mumbled, floating off to the side."

"There, there," Page 65537 consoled her, patting her on the shoulder. "It was a good try, Monty Python and the Holy Grail is a fairly popular book. It's highly likely that he's read it."

Page 17 gazed up at her with unamused eyes. "If you're trying to make me feel better, you are failing."

Next, Page 257 floated up to the Espeon. "My questions are all going to be concerning male anatomy, as it is one of my favorite subjects. I hope you don't mind."

"Go ahead. I'll try my best," he smiled calmingly.

Perking up at the lack of verbal backlash, she smiled back. "Thank you. First question: What is Critical Ecstasy?"

Holding his hand to his chin, Kevin recalled one of the conversations he'd had with Alice. "If I remember correctly, it is what happens when a human male orgasms as a result of mating with a monster. It causes them to be robbed of their ability to fight back any further, and is caused by an abundance of dark magic inherent to all monsters seeping into their body through the mating experience."

"Correct," the page monster nodded. "It's one of the most interesting phenomena I've come across in my studies. The fact that you appear to be a male monster makes me wonder if it will happen to you, but I understand that you prefer to keep our interaction to a professional level."

"Much obliged."

"My second question is: around what age does a male experience puberty?"

"The average is between nine and fourteen years old, but there have been cases of the onset of puberty starting earlier or later."

"Correct again. You seem to know a lot about the male body too," she complimented him.

"Not really," he brushed off the praise. In actuality, he only knew this because he'd offhandedly read it in a biology textbook and never would've remembered it in his base form, but his Espeon form had the ability to recall everything from his entire life just by sifting through his memories.

Page 257's cheeks turned red upon thinking of the last question she had for him. "L-last question," she started, taking a deep breath before shyly looking him in the eye. "How long is your penis?"

Time seemed to screech to a halt as her words echoed through the suddenly-silent room. Page 17 and Page 65537 stared at Page 257 with wide eyes, their jaws having dropped in shock at her asking such a question so soon after he'd threatened to KILL HER when she asked for semen. Even Alice perked up at this, stealthily looking their way out of the corner of her eye and focusing her hearing on what would come next.

Page 65537 moved forward to defend her subordinate . "I am so sorry for this, Mr. Kevin. We can skip this question if you –"

"It's fine," the Espeon replied, his face showing no signs of the expected anger or annoyance. "You did say that the only limits for the questions were that they had to be about something that I was capable of knowing. She didn't break the rules, and I can't begrudge her for her curiosity, despite the unscientific nature of it.

"As for the answer…I'm unable to tell you, because there is a certain lamia eavesdropping right now who would love to use it against me." The huff of annoyance coming from Alice's direction confirmed his statement to the others. "As a consolation prize for you being bold enough to ask, yet reserved enough to not try forcing it, I will tell you this: there is not just one answer to that question, but nine. I have eighteen bodies, including my base form, with half of them being male. As far as I'm aware from my memories of being in those forms, my genitals change size to be proportionate to whatever body I am using."

The shy monster's brain short-circuited at that moment, as did Alice's. The lamia had never considered the fact that when he changed forms, his penis would likely get bigger as well. She'd already thought about what would happen if she could convince Kevin to 'feed' her, but now there was the added mystery of what kind of experience each form could bring to the 'meal.'

After a solid minute of Page 257 floating there without moving, her boss decided it would probably be for the best to use one of her tentacles to move her off to the side and let her immerse herself in whatever fantasy she was having without interruption. Leaving her a few yards away next to Page 17, the boss monster re-donned her poker face before approaching Kevin again.

"Since you've refused to answer Page 257's last question, that leaves only one more strike and four questions left," she began. "Although, I would like to thank you for indulging her curiosity and not lashing out. As such, at the end of the trial, even if you lose, I will give you an additional gift."

Kevin shrugged. "You don't need to, but it would be appreciated. I know for a fact that my base form would've shot her down in an incredibly rude way, after all, so I did spare her from that."

Nodding, the monster continued. "As for my questions, I've decided to ask only riddles. It's easy to gather facts from books, but the ability to think through problems without needing outside knowledge is just as important. Are you ready?"

"As I'll ever be."

"Then let us begin. Riddle one: Imagine you are inside of an iron box. There are no doors, no windows, and no holes or cracks through which air or light can get through. You have no access to any of your powers, and all four of your limbs are chained to the floor and walls. How do you get out?"

Kevin took a thinking pose for a few seconds, before grinning. "I stop imagining."

Page 65537 nodded. "Correct. The key to the riddle was that in the first sentence I told you to imagine that you were in the box, so it stands to reason that the way out is to stop imagining. You'd be surprised at how few people are able to come to that conclusion. But I digress, on to riddle two: a ship sailing out on the seas is struck by a storm, and every single person onboard dies. Yet, a week later, the ship arrives at a port with several men and women still alive. How is this possible?"

This one required a bit longer for the teenager to think a lot harder. If every single person died in the storm, but there were still some left to bring the boat back to the port, logic would dictate that someone else found the ship and brought it back. However, that isn't how riddles work, so there must be some clever wordplay that he wasn't immediately spotting.

Then, he saw it, and let out a short laugh. "All of the survivors were married," he stated victoriously. "Only the 'single' passengers died in the storm."

"To be honest, I didn't expect you to be able to answer that one at all. It's not my hardest one, but it DOES have the kind of obscure context that usually stumps humans and monsters alike. Now, my last riddle, while not being the most complicated one I know, is one that I've only ever encountered once, and nobody has been able to tell me the right answer. Are you prepared?"

"Absolutely," he replied with a challenging grin.

Page 65537 grinned right back. "Here it is: I am at the beginning of Eternity and the end of Time and Space. The beginning of every End, and the End of every Place. What am I?"

Funnily enough, Kevin knew the answer immediately. He'd encountered this riddle in particular in his past life while browsing the internet for ways to distract his older brother. At one point, he'd gotten hooked on using riddles to confuse his idiotic older sibling, and found himself diving deep into the most obscure and weird of the them. This one just happened to be included in that search.

"The letter 'E,'" he replied without missing a beat.

The monster froze for a second. "Have…have you heard this one before?"

"Yes, and it's still as good as the first time I read it," he smiled good-naturedly.

She let out a sigh of relief. There were few things more embarrassing than placing so much faith in the complexity of a puzzle or riddle, only for someone to solve it within seconds. The reassurance that it wasn't as easy to unravel as he made it look was enough to quell the fears she had of coming across as 'acting smarter than she actually was.

"Nine questions down, one to go, and still only one strike remaining. Allow us to discuss what the final question should be," she requested, before floating off to the side with her subordinates.

They whispered back and forth between themselves for a solid ten minutes, gesturing with their limbs and/ or tentacles, nodding and shaking their heads, etc. While Kevin could use the unparalleled Psychic might he held in this form to just read their minds and cheat, he was actually having fun with this and didn't want to ruin the surprise. Plus, cheating on a test is for those without enough intelligence or morals to get through life the hard way.

The trio returned, with Page 257 looking particularly eager for her boss to pose whatever question they had come up with, Page 17 not changing her expression at all, and Page 65537 halfway in between. "The final question we have for you is a yes or no question. Depending on the answer you give, you may have to follow through with it to prove that you are correct. Are you ready?"

Kevin merely nodded in response.

"Good. The question is: would you be willing to bring some men down here from above and feed them to us?"

Out of all the things they could've asked, this one was the most interesting. If he said 'no,' him not doing anything would prove that he's telling the truth. But if he said 'yes,' he would have to leave the library and lead three men down here so that these monsters could have something to sate themselves. If he was in his base form, the teenager would be caught between not wanting the three monsters to even THINK about raping him, and not wanting to go to the effort of luring some of the idiots from above to their very sexual doom.

In his Espeon evolution, though, the answer was easy. "Yes," he responded with a calm smile. "In fact, let me do so right now." He then proceeded to close his eyes and concentrate.

At first, both the book monsters and Alice thought he was doing nothing. Then his aura came to life, going from dormant to active as if a switch were suddenly flipped. However, nothing happened around them for a few minutes, leading the four of them to wonder what exactly he was using his seemingly-bottomless well of magic to accomplish.

Their questions were answered when the basement door opened with a pink glow, allowing three men to walk through and approach the waiting monsters. The small group was made up of a guard in full armor, a scholar in robes, and a priest who appeared to be younger than any of the ones Alice and Kevin had seen up above. Most notable about their behavior was the dazed expressions on their faces, as if they had no idea what they were doing or where they were going. It didn't take a genius to put two and two together and come to the conclusion that Kevin was controlling them.

They stopped a short distance away from the monsters, not reacting at all to their presence. "Done," Kevin nodded, opening his eyes and gesturing to the hypnotized men. "I chose one from each group, both to prevent suspicions and provide you with variety. Although, I'll admit that the reason for these three in particular being here is that all three of them are morons who think with their religion instead of their brains. I figured, with you guys taking care of them, they would be less likely to spread their stupidity too far."

"You are aware that this is just a drop of water in the lake that is the collective idiocy of Ilias' followers, right?" Alice called over, unable to keep herself from commenting.

"Yes, I am," the Espeon sighed. "To be honest, I was half tempted to empty out the entire castle with how many of these religious screwballs I found, but I eventually decided to just pick the worst of each bunch."

As for the book monsters, they were both surprised and elated by the gift the teenager had brought them. It only took a few seconds for them to divide the men up between them, with the scholar going to Page 65537, the guard being snapped up by Page 257, and the priest ending up with page 17. Being book monsters, each of them had a private dimension they'd created within the books they inhabited, but it was obvious that they wouldn't be able to use [Four Animists and their Sources] anymore with Kevin taking it with him. As a result, they each quickly possessed a different book on the nearby shelves and quickly stored their captives inside before they could snap out of the trance.

Recollecting herself from the overpowering joy of finding a new mate after such a long time, Page 65537 addressed Kevin again. "You have passed the trial. As per our agreement, you now have our permission to not only read [Four Animists and their Sources], but take it with you as well.

"Additionally," she continued, reaching out into the air and pulling a rather thick book out of a pocket dimension. "As thanks for keeping the Monster Lord from burning down the library, indulging Page 257 in her curiosity, and bringing us the means of surviving here for the next one hundred years, I would like to give you this Monsterpedia."

Upon accepting the gift and holding it in his hands, Kevin was immediately assaulted by multiple messages from the Eeveelution system.

[Congratulations!]

[Due to "defeating" a Boss Type monster in possession of an Element you have not absorbed yet; you have unlocked the full power of Normal Type Energy!]

[Form: Eevee will now be able to use all Moves to their full extent with no repercussions, other than those detailed in the Move Descriptions.]

[Attention Host: one Pure Energy Type has been detected within the object the Host is currently holding. The Host is already in possession of this Type, but assimilation of this artifact will unlock more functions within the Eeveelution System. Would the Host like to assimilate the energy into himself to unlock new functions?]

Multiple conclusions were drawn at the same time in the teenager's head. First, and most importantly, was the revelation that he doesn't need to beat a Boss monster in a physical battle to absorb their energy. He could defeat them in other ways, such as how he passed the trial Page 65537 had set. Next, was that he could now utilize the extremely overpowered Moves in the Normal Type list, such as [Judgement] and [Hyper Beam], without temporarily crippling himself. Add to that the fact that his previous assumptions that using these moves was a bad idea was correct, and you get a very relieved Kevin right now.

Finally, and most immediately relevant, was that the System classified the book in his hands as a magical artifact capable of being assimilated. Seeing as it was called a Monsterpedia, literally anything the System took from it would almost definitely be worth it.

'Yes,' he mentally told the System.

[Commencing Assimilation]

The light show accompanied by the book being absorbed into his body surprised the three page monsters, but that was to be expected at this point. Kevin was more focused on waiting for the System to tell him what boon he'd receive from it.

[Congratulations! The Assimilation of the artifact Monsterpedia was a success!]

[New Menu Option unlocked: Monsterpedia.]

Kevin opened the option on the function without hesitation, and couldn't help himself from smiling at what he saw. It was a digitized book with descriptions of every known monster in the world, with descriptions, noted behaviors, and tips for fighting them. It was also split in half, with the second half being a list of all of the monsters he'd met so far, including their names and small details about their personalities and/or the way they interacted with him. It was the perfect gift.

"Thank you very much," he said with a slight bow, showing Page 65337 more respect than he had for anyone else since he arrived in this world. "I will endeavor to use it wisely."

Page 65337 blinked a few times, before shaking her head. With everything he'd already done so far, she shouldn't be surprised that he was capable of absorbing a book. "I have no doubt that you will. Now, if you will excuse me, I have a mate to indoctrinate." A split second later, Alice and Kevin were alone again in the library.

Kevin took the opportunity to change back to his Eevee form, and was immediately aware of the change. He felt as if he could run longer, jump higher, and lift more weight than he ever could in either this life or his last. His rampant apathy, though, made it so he didn't WANT to do any of that. Instead, he walked over to Alice as he slipped [Four Animists and their Sources] into his backpack.

"You ready to head out?" he asked.

Alice cocked her head to the side. "I thought you wanted to read the book."

"I do," he nodded. "Just not in a place that reeks of ashes and hypocrisy."

The lamia had to admit that he did have a point. "Let's go, then. By the way, can you store these five baked potatoes in your bag for later?"

"Sure."

With nothing left to say or grab, they left the library.

***

{Author's Note}

What do you shlubs think? The first chapter where Kevin beats a group of enemies without having to raise a fist, and everyone goes away happy. Well, the three religious screwballs might not be happy for a while, but they'll get used to their captivity.

Sneak peak at what's up next: Reading the book, planning for the search for the Four Spirits, and a little chat with Ilias about what is and isn't okay for friends to do to each other. Spoiler: It's not okay to make your friend an unwilling Hero to your crazy cult.

As always, comment on the paragraphs and the chapter itself. Try not to be a dick, memes are appreciated, and correct my grammar so I can fix it for future readers!

See you later!