Find the next number in the sequence

5 12 24 36 ?

A swan sits at the center of a perfectly circular lake. At an edge of the lake stands a ravenous monster waiting to devour the swan. The monster can not enter the water, but it will run around the circumference of the lake to try to catch the swan as soon as it reaches the shore. The monster moves at 4 times the speed of the swan, and it will always move in the direction along the shore that brings it closer to the swan the quickest. Both the swan and the the monster can change directions in an instant.
The swan knows that if it can reach the lake's shore without the monster right on top of it, it can instantly escape into the surrounding forest.

How can the swan successfully escape?

An octopus has 8 legs. A hippogriff has 6 legs and 2 pairs of wings. A sphinx has 6 legs and one pair of wings. Now we have all 3 kinds and a total of 18 insects in a cage. We have a total of 118 legs and 20 pairs of wings. How many insects do we have of each kind?

How high do you have to count before you use the letter “a” in the English spelling of the whole number?

The average age of 10 members of a committee is the same as it was 4 years ago, because an old member has been replaced by a young member. Find how much younger is the new member ?

In a secret society, a buried chamber can be accessed only via a secret password. The password is seven characters long and comprises of just letters and numbers.

You find a code that can help you in cracking the password. The code says "You force heaven to be empty".

Can you deduce the password from that?

From a pack of 52 cards, I placed 4 cards on the table.

I will give you 4 clues about the cards:

Clue 1: Card on left cannot be greater than the card on the right.
Clue 2: Difference between the 1st card and 3rd card is 8.
Clue 3: There is no card of an ace.
Clue 4: There are no face cards (queen, king, jacks).
Clue 5: Difference between the 2nd card and 4th card is 7.

Identify four cards?

I am the largest in my family of fifty.
The youngest of our family lives separately from the rest of the family and so do I.
I am regarded as harsh and tough.
I am so large, you cut me in two equal halves,
each half would still be larger than the second largest member of the family.
Who am I?

Find the number of squares in the below-given picture.

What does this simple rebus mean?