While the six "Great Powers" dominate galactic politics, there are numerous other species and break-off colonies that possess interstellar travel. Some of these species are vassals to the Great Powers, whilst others have managed to maintain independence.

Most Terran refugees from the Monroe Wars found homes on Terran colonies, within or without of the newly formed Terran Sovereignty, or became involved in various Fulgar enterprises... the Arkborne represent a notable exception.

Remaining mobile as a nomadic fleet of ships the Arkborne are guided by a stern religious coda known as "the Laws of Redemption". Today the Arkborne rarely interact with others beyond trading rare resources they've salvaged in exchange for fuels, repairs, and common goods and services. 

It should be noted though, that the services they provide can include assassination, privateering, and sabotage. Their operatives are highly sought after for their dedication and professionalism.

The Fulgar originally sold the Barrodga interstellar technology during the Triadic War of centuries past... they've since come to deeply regret this, because the Barrodga are a militaristic, brutish, and argumentative people who are more than happy to raid neighboring Fulgar colonies and have loosely allied themselves with the Regime of Tothk in order to avoid any serious reprisals.

The belicose nature of the Barrodga is spurred on by the fact that Barrodga are fully aware that their homeworld will be consumed by their star going nova in the next few thousand cycles. As such, the Barrodga are desperate to acquire advanced technologies so that they may compete on a galactic stage and conquer new worlds.

Peaceful migration however, has seemingly never occurred to them and their fractious non-united governments preclude the concept of any feasible cooperation with others or even each other.

Hailing from beyond the Lytherian Expanse, the nocturnal and venomous Cresanthi are a mysterious people the Lytherians have had contact with for centuries, and in exchange for information, technology, and occasionally transport, the Cresanthi have offered the Lytherians their services... which can only be described as "precognitive".

Specifically, the Lytherians often employ the Cresanthi in choosing the best possible sites for new settlements, and seemingly, this has helped those choices avoid future natural disasters and other potential pitfalls. Additionally and more exotically, the Cresanthi have several organizations that specialize in utilizing their unique talents for assassinations.

Today, given the Lytherians perilous political situation, they are hiring the Cresanthi often... typically to remove foreign individuals who pose a threat to their trade or their ambitions to acquire a beneficial alliance with one of the Great Powers. When a Terran civil servant suggests that conquering the Lytherian Expanse would be a great idea... and then suddenly is found dead the next cycle... one can safely assume a Cresanthi was involved.

Whilst the Cresanthi have happily traded for technology, it is interesting that they have not seemingly employed that technology into their infrastructure, and they seem to have no star-faring vessels and few orbital assets. Their cities remain beautiful, but ultimately primitive monoliths of meticulously hand-carved ivory stone, and electricity is a luxury afforded only to the wealthiest and the most important of state industries... the average Cresanthi left to live a humble existence by candlelight and hearth-fire.

"If you can't find a fool, find a Delnorian, they're the next best thing!" is a unfortunate Fulgar turn of phrase. The Delnorians live on a barren world (Delnor) with few natural resources and their various nations were warring over these resources with pre-atomic technology for several centuries when the Fulgar encountered them.

The Fulgar, sold weapons to one of these nations and helped establish a brutal worldwide dictatorship on Delnor. In exchange, the resulting Delnorian government agreed to keep their markets closed off to anyone other than the Fulgar, provide a great number of their people for manual labor and as contracted mercenaries as well.

Today, Delnorians can be found working the worst jobs on virtually any Fulgar outpost or colony and many of them have slipped away and become criminals.

Some systems are not directly connected by Starways but are instead simply close enough to a Starway, that they can be reached in a reasonable time frame. Such systems are typically considered backwaters and rarely explored. The Regime of Tothk however, have recently been making concerted efforts to explore any such systems within their reach and whilst doing so, they discovered the Eylduwu on a large swampy moon orbiting a gas giant.

The Eylduwu are a race of extremely intelligent herbivores who use their tendril like mouth parts to feed off vegetation and manipulate their environment... and they stand roughly 15 Terran meters high. This makes the Eylduwu the largest known sentient race.

The Tothk eventually made contact with the Eylduwu and learned that their species is surprisingly knowledgeable about mathematics, physics, and other sciences, despite possessing seemingly no technology of any kind... there are no structures, no underground labs, and no power sources on their planet.

Furthermore, the Tothk who've spent time with the Eylduwu often note the peaceful, but intensely secretive nature of their hosts... and also commonly remark on a overwhelming feeling of calm when in the presence of any Eylduwu.

Today the Tothk maintain a small embassy and listening post on the homeworld of the Eylduwu, Ulydias, and have generally agreed to provide protection to the Eylduwu in exchange for any rare resources found within their solar system. The Eylduwu are extremely wary of visiting outsiders, and have only recently begun approving small numbers of anthropologists from other worlds to visit them.

The Kahna are a fairly tall and lanky species of intelligent canid-like bipeds, well adapted to hot and arid climates. The species emenates from the planet Kahnar-Ru and have a somewhat mysterious origin. It would appear, that at some point in history Kahnar-Ru was inhabited by a different intelligent species, and that the Kahna themselves were genetically engineered as either a subspecies or entirely uplifted from another animal altogether, to produce a well adapted slave-soldier caste for the pre-existing civilization.

At some point, whether due to a revolt by the Kahna themselves or by means of a civil war, the overarching civilization collapsed, and the Kahna emerged as the only surviving intelligent species on the planet. There, amongst the many ruined cities, the Kahna divided into many competing clans or tribes, with females forming their civil society and maintaining the highly automated factory-cities that produced military equipment, vehicles, and interstellar transports... whilst males serve as soldiers and mercenaries bent on proving themselves worthy of breeding to the females through combat and exploits. Despite constant internal warfare the tribes are careful not to endanger their factory "nesting sites", and deem it taboo to attack them, as they do not have the technical understanding to fully repair or restore such facilities if they were heavily damaged.

Today the Kahna can be encountered in a wide area of space, as they often send nomadic expeditions to serve more advanced empires as mercenaries to engage in combat on alien worlds. Amongst Terrans, the Khana's similarity to Terran Jackals has led to the nickname "Jacks" or "Dog-Boys, and they are regarded negatively as pirates, and scavengers.

The Minzari are tall and fish like in appearance, with crests coming from their foreheads and tiny yellowy eyes emerging from the sides of their face. Evolving on a variety of small stony island subcontinents amongst a vast ocean, the Minzari homeworld is peculiar for having never evolved any form of "tree". 

The Minzari themselves are a contemplative and self reflective people who have never fully industrialized their society and are happy to leave galactic politics to others. The Minzari do possess star drives (purchased from the Fulgar long ago) and occasionally send out diplomatic or research expeditions, because while the Minzari generally wish to be left alone, they hunger for knowledge and wisdom of all things.

A quiet people who are slow to anger and equally cautious to befriend others.

The Murglings are a diminutive, bellicose, and hardy people who lack any technology beyond what might be described by Terrans as "neolithic". Strangely, these creatures have been observed on no less than seven habitable worlds... it is a mystery how they have been transported to multiple planets and genetic analysis has shown that none of these planets are the Murgling's world of origin.

Most races consider the Murglings to be vermin and either ignore or exterminate them when encountered. The Veygar in particular, enjoy hunting and slaughtering large numbers of Murglings for sport, whilst the Aquilarans have been known to use them in various experiments.

While it is extremely rare to see Zrenrakkan "explorers", Aquilaran intelligence services have observed Murglings interacting peaceable with Zrenrakkans on two occasions and described this as "really weird".

The Novari home system was destroyed by super-nova nearly five hundred cycles ago. They were fortunate enough to develop technology and estimate their star's collapse in advance of this event. Choosing to build great migrant fleets and abandon their home system the Novari narrowly escaped extinction.

Today the Novari are largely a nomadic race and have been largely unsuccessful in establishing a single new homeworld as they lack the military capability to defend themselves. Instead Novari either continue to travel space in their ancient ships, or otherwise establish small and inoffensive colonies, often on worlds claimed by other races.

The Tothk for example, allow Novari settlements so long as they control their population growth rate and do not exceed 10% of the local Tothk population and remain unarmed. This may seem harsh, but considering that the Ukaros, Aquilarans, and Zrenrakka prefer to exterminate the Novari settlements whenever possible, the Tothk approach is relatively generous.

Once a proud people who pursued art and philosophy, the Novari are now excellent engineers, pilots, and smugglers who can salvage even the most damaged ships to expand their migrant fleets.

To a Terran, a Lytherian looks somewhat frog-like, with slender limbs, bulbous eyes, and a preference for hot and humid environs. Emerging near the outer edge of the Galactic Commons, the stars around the Lytherians have few and heavily degraded starwars... as a result the Lytherians did not discover them, and instead have been relying on generational craft to establish orbital city-states throughout the region. This suits the Lytherians, as they are very culturually diverse and new iterations of government, religion, and ideologies are constantly fomenting, and so, each city-state station is its own little civilization.

Still, when the Fulgar encountered the Lytherians, they gained access to FTL capabilities, and quickly came to find that their "expanse", while slow to travel even with FTL, was also naturally guarded from any quick seizure by the major powers of the galaxy. Furthermore, the expanse represented a natural choke-point between the Galactic Commons and a large section of the outer rim of the galaxy.

The Lytherians are a hospitable people and are considered one of the most tolerant species in the galaxy. Though traveling to the Lytherian Expanse is difficult, the Lytherians are welcoming of refugees and considered a "haven" to the abused and dispossessed. Some of the wealthiest Terrans of the galaxy have established themselves safe communities among the Lytherians.

For a long time the Lytherians have enjoyed relative safety from the major powers of the galaxy and have been able to maintain their fractious political structure and enjoying the diverse migration of outsiders into their realm looking for safety. This has changed with the discovery of the Zrenrakka, who have appeared out the outer rim beyond their space, and should the Zrenrakka decided they wish to invade the Galactic Commons they would first have to go through the Lytherian Expanse. Today, the Lytherians are converting their space-cities into mighty fortresses and are hiring any mercenaries they can get their hands on, whilst courting major powers to invest in their defense and independence as a bulwark against the Zrenrakkan threat.

The Saurischans are a large scaly lizard-like race who were encountered and subsequently enslaved by the Ukaros over two centuries ago. At the time, the Saurischans were a fairly peaceful people and were beginning to industrialize, but that was all disturbed by the Ukaros occupation.

Centuries of enslavement and use by the Ukaros as cannon-fodder in various conflicts turned the Saurischans into warrior people with a particularly dark and tragic sense of humor if nothing else. During the Monroe Wars this changed, as an early victory for the Terrans was that they were able to convince large numbers of Saurischan levies to defect to their side, and indeed the Terrans successfully instigated a rebellion on the Saurischan home planet.

Though the rebellion was successful, as the Terrans began to lose the Monroe Wars the Saurischans realized that the Ukaros would re-enslave them as soon as the wars concluded, and so, they endeavored to evacuate as much of their citizenry and their culture as they could. Sadly, they were correct, and the Ukaros did re-conquer their home planet, but today millions of Saurischans have managed to escape and create enclave communities all over the galaxy, but it is especially common to encounter them amongst Terrans.

One of the rarest species to encounter, the T'thulian Law Masters appear unbidden through unknown means in a large population center, and then simply offer their services as "arbitrators" to the highest bidders. Their arbitration always seems to involve violence, so they are more commonly understood as mercenaries.  Immensely strong bipeds  who possess large whip like tendrils that come from their back, hosting a large head with many eyes and a tentacled mouth, they are an imposing and inscrutable presence. Reports also suggest that they have incredible reflexes and possibly psychic powers.

T'thulians seem unable to communicate in a straightforward manner, and instead are constantly quoting some incredibly detailed legal code that validates their actions and their purpose. Anthropologists studying the phenonemon of T'thulian appearances believe that their appearance and activities in the broader galaxy is some sort of "coming of age ritual". Regardless, if one is hiring an assassin, a bounty hunter, or a soldier for hire, the very best and most expensive would be a T'thulian Law Master.

The pre-industrial Ursallons were discovered by Terran colonists during the early period of the Terran diaspora into the galaxy. Without any pre-established protocols for dealing with newly discovered sentient life, the colonists proceeded to establish their homes and facilities on the Ursallon planet. Once there, the colonists began a sort of amateur anthropology study of the creatures.

What they found was that the Ursallons (named after their physical similarity to bears) were a technologically primitive people, divided into many numerous tribes, and with aggressive cultures that focused on raiding each other, and physical contests to determine leadership and status.

Initially, the local population of Ursallons avoided the Terran colony and its inhabitants, but gradually contact between the two groups increased, and the colonists eventually made formal contact after translating the local Ursallon language. It is at this point, that otherwise small mistakes in contact procedure, would escalate into a dire situation... as the colonists began to bargain with the Ursallons for their labor in helping them build up their own colony. These bargains were made with the best intentions, typically trading medicinal supplies or food... but by bringing a larger and larger number of Ursallons into close proximity with the colony the opportunity for conflict, and theft in particular, rose exponetially.

It is believed that an Ursallon stole a firearm and then subsequently used it to kill a rival within his tribe, and that this event inspired the Ursallon tribes. What proceeded is not exactly known, but within two years, the Terran colonists were all dead, and the Ursallon tribes of the region had been successfully unified under one particularly ruthless chieftain.

It is a testament to Ursallon ingenuity, that then, within another hundred years or so, they managed to reverse engineer enough of the colonists technology, that they were able to send out a signal offering trade opportunity to others. Some foolish captains of various races would land, typically be ambushed by the Ursallons, and then their ship and technology would also be acquired.

Today, Ursallons have established a large industrialized city, whilst the rest of their planet remains largely pristine... and their people manage to launch raids using captured and/or scavenged spacecraft throughout their region of space. 

No one is exactly certain where the Veygar come from... not even the Veygar. A race of warrior nomads (often described as the "wolf packs" of the galaxy) the Veygar have been spacefaring for a millennia and without a homeworld. During the Monroe Wars the Veygar were enticed to attack and raid Terran settlements by the Ukaros and today they are often seen guarding Ukaros territories for a fee.

Some Veygar served the Ukaros so well that they were gifted a hostile (but inhabitable) planet as a new homeworld and this has become a hotbed for illicit activity... the planet of Kharn.

In general, the Veygar are ruthless and apply a crude cunning to all aspects of life. Terrans typically compare the Veygar to the Mongols of ancient history... and the analogy is not inaccurate.

The Xhoamm are a floating mass of flesh and tentacle like appendages, apparently evolved to exist in incredibly thick atmospheres with relatively low gravity, where, they are capable of low-level flight and hovering at will. Their unique biology requires that they use significant cybernetic enhancements in order to function within the typical environs of other species, and so, they often appear more like strange floating machines than their more natural jellyfish like selves.

Regardless, the Xhoamm are extremely enigmatic and no one knows where their homeworld is located or virtually anything about their language or culture. The Xhoamm have made special agreements to colonize planets that suit their needs within other species' empires. Various empires believe this to be a very lucrative opportunity, as the Xhoamm pay handsomely in various resource wealth for the privilege to colonize a world that the host empire usually considers uninhabitable and virtually useless to themselves. It should be noted that the Xhoamm possess highly advanced technology and this usually helps them maintain their quiet independence within other's realms.

Those Xhoamm encountered living outside of their own domains are typically reclusive individuals offering very specialized services and maintaining a unorthodox network of individuals to aid them... they seem to enjoy the collection and trade of very rare objects, subtances, or people.