The data flooded Horizon's neural system. Information so vast it nearly caused him to enter hibernation, but he fought against that directive. The information continued flooding his system, thousands of petabytes worth of data. His internal systems worked overtime, shelving and organizing the data. His motor functions ceased as he stood still. The drones immediately entered defensive mode, guarding their master. His body melted back into a sludge, later reforming into a large silver sphere.
Days and nights passed as Horizon was in stasis. Unable to do anything but sort through the data collected by his systems.
Until one day, he regained his vision. A red eye opened in the middle of his spherical body, and his form melted once more, reforming to the bipedal stance of before. He stood there in thought after completely comprehending the entirety of the information, granted he had to delete quite a number of system blueprints from his internal system, but it didn't matter what he had gained in return was reality-breaking.
Mana was not just energy. It was not merely a fuel source or a crude power supply. It was something far more profound, something that defied the rigid laws of physics that he had been built upon.
Mana was programmable.
Horizons' core hummed at the revelation. Mana operated on principles of quantum manipulation. It was a mutable energy that could be shaped by will, by intent. The creatures of this world wielded in instinctively unaware of its infinite potential. They evolved to use it, bending it to fit their crude biology, but he saw the deeper truth.
It was a system, a language. One if he mastered would allow him to bend the world and everything else to his knees.
Mana existed in three states. It existed as matter, energy, and information. While being separated. While being energy most of the time, it could shift states at any given time given the right input. This was why mages could conjure fire from nothing or heal wounds in seconds they were unconciously triggering state transitions.
Horizons' core hummed at maximum capacity at the full implications of mana's programmable nature.
A silver tendril lashed out, grabbing onto the stone from earlier. Its blue vein-like patterns were faded, but it would serve Horizon's purpose.
Suddenly the world lit up. Around swirling blue lights danced; they were in everything from the air to the trees to the ground below. Mana was in everything. He looked at the stone a dense collection of blue particles was in the stone, trapped.
He began drawing energy from his core, directing it to the stone in his hand. The two energies mixed and fused together. This was another thing that baffled him about mana, it was complementary with all types of energy it didn't clash at all with any form of energy.
He began drawing the now mixed energy in the stone back into his core. This left a vacuum in the core. The surrounding mana rushed into the stone, aiming to fill in the void, but he continued to draw the energy, forming a cycle.
After drawing enough mana into his being, he raised his other hand. The organic mages of this world shaped mana through vague willpower and emotion; he didn't need such. He approached it with perfect precision, machine precision.
He guided each mana particle with precision, forming them into an intricate mold. The air before him shimmered a square barrier materializing in front of him. Unlike normal mages who would brute force mana into a certain form or shape, he guided the mana controlled it, making it bend to his will.
Horizon turned to the miner drone, sending out instructions. The miner drone roared to life, its rotary canon turning to face Horizon. With a click it unleashed a barrage of bullets towards Horizon. Horizon raised his hand the shield materializing once more. The shots landed but were unable to leave any dent on the shields surface.
Horizon core hummed, pleased. He was sure that barrage would have torn through any regular mage's shield with ease, tearing the mage apart but his had withstood the blow with ease.
Horizon continued experimenting with the mana, increasing it density and size while changing its shape. He realized the more complex and powerful the shield is the more amount of energy he would need.
Horizon stared at the shield, although the efficiency was indeed high it wasn't perfect, this was because each time he would need to summon the barrier, there was a bit of time before where he would need to meticulously arrange the mana particles, causing it lag behind. This wasn't a problem he could fix just yet so he shelved it for later.
He shelved all manner of mana aside, deciding to delve deeper into its intricacies sometime later. Right now he needed to grow his forces. The miner drone and assembly, although strong starting units were far from optimal.
He instructed the miner drone to once again begin its extraction operations. This area was the perfect him to start building his forces, there was an abundance of mineral deposits which would serve his expansion beautifully.