Sheep, Wolves & Dragons

Imagine, if you will, a pastoral scene with no fences. A lush land, well watered and green.
Herds of happy ruminant families roaming & feeding in a relaxed way.
The grasslands are bordered by forests and high rugged mountain ranges.
Occasionally packs of predator breeds emerge from the dense dark forests & take the weak stragglers for food.
The predators increase in number & develop a co-operative hunting style whereby they herd the ruminants into smaller groups which can be controlled & watched over so that the weakest can be quickly spotted and culled.
In such a verdant scene the ruminants are well provided with fodder & so they breed faster until the herds become unmanageable by the herding technique.
The predators also have increased their number &, due to their aggressive nature, begin to battle between themselves in rivalry for control of the herds & territory.
The predators develop a hierarchy in which the most savage is superior and the weakest is rejected from the pack, leading to certain death because hunting alone is extremely difficult.
A predator cannot become a ruminant.
A ruminant cannot become a predator.

What force could change the balance of power?

A new predator, which is capable of preying upon both ruminants & predators enters the scene. This predator has fashioned weapons & traps. This predator is capable of behaving like a ruminant & a predator. It also has a hierarchy which elevates a few of its number, not because they are physically strongest but because they are capable of boundless cruelty, wiley strategy & an insatiable greed.
Soon the new predator has claimed all the territory & reduces the herds to favoured breeds enclosed in protected corrals, robbing the original predators of their hunting grounds.
The only safe escape from these new predators is into the dark forests & onto the difficult terrain of the mountains where survival is less assured.
Having dominated the land the new predator species begins to change the beautiful pastoral scene by forcing the land to provide specific crops & useful ruminants for consumption. Their numbers grow at an accelerated speed & so do their dwelling places.

Again, what force could change the balance of power?

The changes inflicted upon the delicate balance of nature in the pastoral scene have been profound. The surrounding forest has been plundered for its wood & the mountains stripped for their minerals.
All life exists only by permission of the ruling hierarchy, only valued for its usefulness in the strategy of domination.
The pastoral valleys no longer languish between protective forests, the mountain streams no longer flow clean but erode the life giving soils, sweeping them away & out to muddy estuaries where they fester & decay.
The air is no longer sweet & clean.
The winds increase & the rains become unreliable.
Crops fail, ruminants starve & the dominant species of predators, like the earliest of predators fights for control of more territory to exploit.
Soon the most savage among them begin devising ways to decrease their numbers. Great wars are fought & many are killed but the dominant species continues to grow, decimating the resources & polluting the environment.
Ever more efficient weapons are developed but the full impact of their power is unrecognised. Still the population grows but is gradually sickening.
The ruling predators continue to claim dominion even though the great forces of nature, air, water, earth & fire are becoming ever more violent & turbulent.
The rulers blame their subjects.
The subjects blame the rulers.

Neither have any respect for the voiceless forces of nature which have nurtured their existence since the beginning & which are known to have erupted into chaos many times in the past.

The forces of nature, the mythical dragons of water, earth, air & fire, are capable of clashing & conspiring to pulverise, pound & completely reshape their territory until they have obliterated everything that supports life.
They are capable of settling their differences & restoring harmony between them until all becomes peaceful again.

Life depends on this cycle of chaos & order.
Life is the harmonious product of the great dragon forces.
Life will go on, for it has a mission that only it will ever know & nothing will stand in its way.