That Time I Quit My Overly-Analytical Life to Role-play as a Retired High School Teacher in Roblox, and Now I'm Accidentally a Parkour God?

Published: August 3, 2025

I feel strange. I'm happy that I did something new. I broke out of my shell, but at the same time, I feel out of balance, like I'm homeless. It's not that I haven't been able to be very creative with the new things in which I've engaged, given that it is part of creativity that one is consuming as well (input, output). It is just that there was no distance between me and the immersed thing. I wasn't writing down about my experience. I just went full-force into it. I wasn't re-reading a web novel that I read years ago while writing about the experience. I was doing the equivalent of reading the web novel and truly forgetting everything around myself, but not just with one thing, but with many multiple things. I really immersed myself. It's funny that I have written much about wanting to do that. But when I finally do that, it feels like I'm pushed out of balanced, not tired or sad or angry or at a loss in a hole-in-my-heart kind of way, not that kind of homeless. But more so just slightly standing on one foot. For context, this is not about a web novel. I am using that as an analogy.

The Teacher Experiment

To explain, one of those new things that I did without using analytical or reflective writing as a middle-man was role-playing in an older Roblox high school game as if I was back in the early 2010s.

I role-played as a teacher who liked fishing in his free time. I was genuinely asking questions during each class, being the only teacher in that high school. When my favorite students finally left, I decided to retire after that one week I spent with them. So after fishing during the weekends (Saturday and Sunday), on Monday, I announced that I was going to retire at the end of the day, and that this was the last day. The classes were chaotic, unlike the last week when they were much more participating. It was unproductive, and they were talking in groups in the classes, not answering my questions, one of them even insulting me in the last class at the end of the day. Then, I finally left.

An Unexpected Connection

The time that I spent with my favorite students (John [kenva, @Miitsuha] and yomkakas [@MehThePotato88]) and the other students who were there in that last week who were also responsive was great. It happened all of a sudden. I did not really plan to role-play. I just rolled with it because I so happened to spawn in the game in the Teacher role/team. Then it became a whole thing that I did for many hours. My "retirement" was me really just quitting the game while maintaining the role-play effect. I did not speak with the students at all after classes and just went fishing, which was part of the persona but also as a way for me to take a break in between teaching. As time went on and I and the two students got closer, there was even one time when I went to the house of one of them, so it reminded me of what it is really like in real life in school, where you at first are just students and a teacher but gradually become more involved in each other's lives, breaking usual rhythms and introducing more complex dynamics over time. Anyway, that was what it was like.

I should mention that during the time of my two favorite students, that was also the great "Nobody Was Here" incident, during which the other good students who answered my questions left and it was only the two of them. It lasted two days of the week, and during that time, we wanted more students. But when the new students finally came, it was great at first since the two of them were still there, but when they finally left and there were only new and new students, it culminated in that chaotic unproductive Monday. I already planned to retire on Monday even without the two, because I really was tired and spent many hours in that one server, being one of the three that stayed for an hour or so to keep it alive. But the chaos only confirmed that decision.

I have never engaged in any extended role-playing for probably over 10 years, and this is the first time that I have engaged in this level of intensity, given that I am now 22 years old and much more proficient at self-expression, communication, creativity, imagination, and writing (fiction, which involves a kind of "role-playing," and non-fiction).

Deeper Immersion

But of course, while this role-playing was a chief point of immersion, there were others. It reminded me of when I used to read web novels above multiple 100,000 words back in 2020, 2021, or so. But this time is different. I was role-playing. I was not writing a fiction story or reading one. This is a higher level of stakes and immersion, since I am the one who has to create active narrative in a social improvisional context, even with the framework of a Roblox high school where you have roles such as Teacher, Senior, Junior, and such.

I learned things like them not knowing what Everquest is, what broadband is, what dial-up is, and all of these other things that I asked about in each class like computer, science, history, and such, and have been able to confirm through my time with my students, like what an actual teacher would experience with today's students. These Roblox players were young, so many of them fit the high school age. Some were Gen Z in college probably, but even they probably don't know the difference. I admitted several times that I was "old" and "unc," not only role-playing as an older male teacher, but I really am older.

I asked things like:

• What is the difference between a long bow and a short bow? (A long bow was used by the English and is one long wood, for warfare, and much harder or heavier to draw, which results in the skeleton morphing over time, while a short bow is often for hunting and mounted archery, more quick-draw, composite, and was used by the Mongols, Huns, Koreans, and such)
• In what medieval war did long bows play a critical role? (Hundred Years' War)
• What is the job of an adjective? (describes nouns and pronouns)
• What does an adverb do? (describes adjectives, verbs, and adverbs)
• What MMORPG was popular around 2000? (Everquest)
• What is the brain of the computer? (CPU)
• What is amphibious warfare? (landing on a beach, cliffs, ports, or riverbanks)
• Where did Allied D-Day land in WW2? (Normandy)
• What is 10 times 10? (100)
• Make a creative sentence using "dog" as a prompt with figure of speech. (I got the dog in me.)
• and many, many more.

I even said things like something along the lines of "a simple sentence can evoke a thousand pictures," even while acknowledging one student's answer about Wattpad needing more than just five words by stating that while novels and poems are different, even one simple sentence can change lives. English was the dreaded subject among my good students, with Drama class being the most awaited.

The Accidental Parkour God

Around eight hours after writing this, I began playing a parkour tower Roblox game, and it was very diffcult. It's not the hardest parkour game. I've seen harder recent ones, but it went to show just how much harder parkour Roblox games have become, now feeling less like obbies and more like actual parkour with how challenging the obstacles are. And now, almost two hours later, I finally reached the top. I spent two staight hours! And while two hours is fairly short given that many Roblox players who grow up on Roblox and parkour can spend years learning, I myself did grow up much with parkour in Minecraft and Roblox. But they were much easier. Nevertheless, I am much more adept at using the keyboard, mouse, computer, and playing video games in general, given that I'm now also 22 years old, having been playing video games since I was a child. The amazing part is not the two hours in a vacuum. It's not that I did this even if there is nothing at all relating to me doing this. There is no reason that I should do this whatsoever before, and it is only recently that I've started playing Roblox much more and especially since that high school thing that I made friends in random Roblox places beyond John and yomkakas to the point that I was invited by one of them to join this parkour tower game. And incentivized by my friend there, I climbed, but I made another friend there and continued climbing. Until, two hours later, I made it. I am a writer! I am not a parkourer! This is a sudden break from who I have been for the last 10 years of my life.

It's so strange. Imagine Hegel suddenly doing Roblox parkour. I'm no Hegel, but I lived my life as if I was Hegel for the last 2 years of my life especially. So to do something like Roblox parkour to this intensity, something that I haven't done in more than 10 years. This is getting out of one's comfort zone and learning an entirely new skill.

The Butterfly Effect: A Gaming History

Nevertheless, this is not truly "suddenly," since I would never come across if it was not for that cascading events, that butterfly effect beginning not with the high school, but even further back when I started playing older Roblox games last year with older Roblox games like The Lost Souls RPG (TLSR) which I played last year for a while—around the time of the 2024 event The Hunt: First Edition where I played Murderers VS Sheriffs DUELS and also when I played Zombie Mayhem—but then started TLSR playing again 5 months ago, going from around level 6,000 last year to my current level, 66,000, this late March and April (which was a mostly solitary journey, due to using solo private server for the most part, with the times I entered a public server involving some brief encounters with all kinds of people like people wanting to be boosted, two random friends who don't want to talk to each other [one of whom I friended, and whose name is Vellex381], brief players who I did boost since they were already at the highest "plot" level, 1,000, to enter the final boss portal, and the rank 1 player), which precedes the topical events, because it was part of my autobiography-journal project to re-expose myself to the past, and when I met this random user nicknamed "cece" (@cg0864422) who I met in some random game called Hotel Elephant in my many brief explorations back in April (almost 4 months ago) along with a brief encounter of the top rank 1 player of TLSR (@mathmaster102) around that time, and when I met "Luv2Mars" (@SendMyLoveToMars) in June 22 (42 days ago) after he friend-requested around a week earlier because I passed him in TLSR (I became rank 3 and he became rank 4) and did not accept immediately because I was worried he was angry, and when I then started reading recently in the digital library Roblox game where each user can make one book Library of Aletheia for more than a month now as of writing. I became more and more active and responsive by upvoting, writing books, and even commenting, which led me to talking to people in chat, so I befriended two players: ZachLikesJJK (@pokezachw) and PeachyILOVECOFFE (@suyrie). This preceded the high school thing which happened only yesterday. Then today, after going through a list of games (first played to last): Library of Aletheia, Tearose Library, Kingdom Life II, Survive The Disasters 2, Endless Train Trip, Kingdom Tales (where I said something along the lines of "He must be thinking about the war" to a silent role-player sitting by the water), Beach House Roleplay (where I met briefly the player "bluerose246" after we did a whole disco music session with several other players, but who I did not befriend even after a funny interaction where they [she?] asked me whether I agreed that orange juice is great and should replace drugs since another male-character user went and complained about wanting to drink and do drugs [even listing down specific drug names] and how they wished it was not haram, in which I added that I preferred mango juice, to which she responded "eww," to which I re-assserted my preference playfully, and where the user "primprimariel" sent me a friend request out of the blue [she has 872 friends in the 164 days of her account being active, so not strange at all]), TLSR, Desert Bus, The Iron Cafe (where I saw someone being an apologist for a Nazi so as to quit prematurely), RetroStudio (where I played a list of games, from first to last, including [LEGACY] Egg Hunt 2025: The Great Voyegge [from which I disconnected immediately], Mining Tycoon v1.1.0 (read desc) where I got the two end game badges, Zombie Survival 2009 [WIP] [which I quit after two or three waves], Work at a Office where you click a button to get money like cookie clicker without the automatic earning and where I quit after getting the "Supervisor" rank [which comes after Trainee, Intern, Experienced Internet, Employee, and Experienced Employee], and School Life! [CLASS UPDATE] where I realized that games like Club Penguin were so powerful because of just how lived-in with unique characters you can talk to that are not part of some plot but as part of the world and full of cultural references every room or place is), Warnet/Gaming Computer (which I hoped was going to be an internet cafe game, but ended up getting disappointed), and then finally, the following game. I met first the user MIA_StichXxlover90 (@StichXxlover90) in the game Funeral Roleplay (where I joshed around and saw some nasty girl players being mean-girl kind of mean to the girl hogging the funeral spot, saying things like attention-seeker and high-pitched voice around boys, and just sounding like they were probably joking when they made her "death" sound like a great thing and like something they made happen intentionally), who I so happened to befriend because we were seconds away from having spent the same amount of time in the game so as to see our times matching each other (she asked me what time, and I read 31 minutes at the door leading to the outside). We waited the entire 31 minutes, standing in front of the door, since the door would only open once we spent an hour in the game, having been at 29 minutes already by the time she asked me what my time was to discover that hers was the same so as to prompt just us staying there for those 31 minutes. Then when we explored the outside and found it boring, she asked me what to play next, and I told her what kind of games she played. She then invited me to Carry Troll Tower, the parkour game, and after seeing her constantly getting carried and quitting and re-joining since you couldn't reset or get out of being carried by someone else, she eventually quit completely, while I kept climbing bit by bit. It was when she left that I met disneyprincessguroh4, who I had a brief conversation with, where she asked me how old I was and I told her "I'm unc" and that I live in the Philippines, only to discover she was only grade 7 and 12 years old and also from the Philippines, specifically from Leyte.

Gallery: Scenes from the Journey

(images are from August 1 to 2, 2025)