Why does "neu" become "Neues" after "etwas"?

Question

I found this sentence in a German children's book: >Jeden Tag entdeckt Katrin etwas Neues. Neues is a noun here? How can that be? I'd think that 'new' was an adjective. As a noun, I found Neue in the dictionary, and then I found other cases of 'etwas Neues' So what is happening here? Is it, in fact, "Neue" that's been changed for some reason?

Answer 1

This happens because you're turning an adjective into a noun, and since etwas is a neuter pronoun, you give it the ending (-es) proper to neuter substantive adjectives (adjectival nouns). You can do this with pretty much any adjective you want: etwas Merkwürdiges (something strange), etwas Besonderes (something special). You can also do it with other pronouns: nichts Unmögliches (nothing impossible), nichts Wichtigeres (nothing more important).