So, now that I've been trapped in late 28-30 purgatory the last couple of months trying to break 500k dust before I even hit level 30, I've had time to ponder...
I think we're the bad guys in this game. We come in clear cut everything. We scare off the native creatures to get their magic dust. We then find some we can domesticate and then cross breed them to make them as nasty and tough as possible (mythical pitbulls). After ruining the environment, we see that we aren't progressing anymore, so we replace the flora that we clear-cut by planting our trees and plants using the magic dust we got from the native creatures. Hopefully we can get experience from replacing everything we clear-cut to keep our civilization going.
Sure, our genetically super creatures don't appear evil, but remember the evil forest creatures from South Park?
I think this game is the story from the side of the once ler from the Lorax before he saw the error in his ways.