Intelligent races are not rare in the multiverse, but multiverse spanning races are very rare. Only five distinct races are known to have spread across more than one universe. Three of the races still exist: elves, orbs, and cross-breeds. Two of the races; Gons, and the Gon’s ancient enemy (goblins?) are extinct. The three remaining races – elves, orbs, and cross-breeds – can and do interbreed.
It is not know which is the oldest of the races. The Orbs, the Gons and the Gon’s ancient enemy all existed in what the elves call the time-before-time. For the egotistical elves, time started a million years ago when they were created, and they have no interest in events before their time.
In the time-before-time the orbs spread through the multiverse settling many worlds and establishing a loose confederation of worlds. Orb civilization encountered the gons. The Orbs were a technologically proficient, multiverse spanning race, and the Gons were constrained to one world. The Gons had the ability to control negative dark energy and could mentally control others, so the Gon’s used their mental abilities to subjugate the Orbs. Eventually the Orbs became vassals of the Gons.
There are varying description of the Gons, and there is no consensus on what a typical Gon resembled. The oldest elf memories are that the ruling Gons more resembled the fierce, flesh eating, Jurassic dinosaurs than anything else. It is known that the Gons were masters of both physical and mental manipulation, so they took different forms depending on both their role in society and the environmental conditions around them.
The Gons spread through the multiverse using the technology developed by their subservient Orbs. Orbs and Gons established a synergistic empire that spanned many universes and existed for uncounted eons.
At some time long ago, the Gons encountered a different race, that had similar mental capabilities as them. The Gon’s and their Orb vassals fought a many millennia long war with their foe. Even the name of the ancient foe is lost in time and is usually just labeled as the ancient enemy.
All three races had settled swaths of the multiverse before encountering the others. The multiverse is so large that there are a bountiful number of worlds to settle, but the ancient enemy was not willing to compromise. The enemy had a hatred for all other races and turned it into a war of survival for both sides.
The two antagonists created many proxy creatures to help in the fight. The dragons, hydra, and vargr are three commonly known creatures created to aid in the war effort. The most famous of the creatures from the Gon’s war are of course, the feared cross-breeds.
The ancient enemy’s ability to manipulate positive and negative dark energy gave them a strategic advantage. It became clear that they would win the war. It might be tens of thousands of years, but the Gons and the Orbs would eventually be eliminated.
The Gons developed a plan to counter the superior abilities of their enemy by developing war fighting creatures that had the abilities of the orbs and the gons.
In order to counter the enemy, the Gons needed a creature with the ability of both the Gons and the Orbs. The Gons worked desperately for centuries to develop the new creature that was to have the capability to use both positive and negative dark energy like the enemy.
It was very difficult to merge gons and orbs into the new war fighting race. The Gons resorted to a two-step process to develop the new race. The first step was to modify a few Gons into an intermediate race, called the elves. This race was physically similar to the orb with the mental abilities of the Gons. Several dozen variants of the female base were created as well as three times that many male base variants. Each was cloned millions of times to generate a viable breeding population. That population was then in-breed for several generations to even out the genetic pool. The elves bred like gons and produced eggs and had many of the traits of gons including the ability to sense and manipulate negative dark energy.
The final step was to breed the orbs and elves to create the new race, the cross-breeds.
The cross-breeds could manipulate positive and negative dark energy like the ancient enemy. With the breeding of a significant number of cross-breeds, the tide of war turned. The war continued for tens of thousands of years, but the ancient enemy eventually was totally eradicated.
After the war, the Gons decided that cross-breeds were too dangerous to keep, so most of the cross-breeds were eliminated. The Gons kept a population of elves in case they ever needed to produce more cross-breeds in a future war. The Gons resumed their harmonious, but dominant relationship with the Orbs. Orbs served both the Gons and the Elves on their worlds, but the Orbs also had many worlds of their own that were allowed to grow and flourish.
Generations later, the elf population had grown and spread to many worlds and was as large as the Gon population. The elves did not like that they were viewed as second class citizens with less value than the Orbs. The elves created a new generation of fighting cross-breeds and had the orbs develop button and control stones to ensure their loyalty. The elves revolted against the Gons in what is called the Fairy War. The great Orb civilizations viewed this as a chance to rid themselves of Gon domination and aligned with the elves. Eventually the elves, their cross-breed fighters, and Orb allies prevailed and eradicated all of the Gons.
When the Gons were eradicated, the elves directed their cross-breed warriors against their orb allies. The orbs realized too late that the elves only interest was to use them as compliant drones. The orbs rebelled against this role and fought the elves, but the cross-breeds gave the elves an overwhelming advantage. All of the great orb civilizations fell and eventually the remaining free Orbs were forced to flee to hidden worlds where many remain to this day.
After the War, the elves again eliminated most of the cross-breeds, and only kept a few small populations that were tightly controlled and used to fight their wars.
That is the situation that has existed in the multiverse for the past million years. A forever war between the free Orbs and the Elves. The free Orbs live on their hidden worlds and strike out against the elves where possible. The Orbs with their creativity and innovative technology have the ability to cause major disruption, but not the ability to defeat the elves. The elves with their war creatures such as dragons and hydra, their captive cross-breeds, and their mental ability can conquer any Orb world they find.
Whenever the elves discover a free orb world, they subjugate it. With their cross-breed warriors and their abilities to influence Orbs, they eventually dominate. The only effective orb strategy is to flee to other hidden worlds. Subjugated worlds are turned into herd worlds. The wild orb herd is overseen by herder elves and when it grows large enough, a Grand Cull is performed. A Grand Cull removes most of the Orbs and only leaves a small residual population that regresses to a primitive state. Then the process is repeated. Over a few thousand years, the herd is allowed to recover and grow again until it is large enough to support another grand cull.