The Nothing is the main antagonist in The Neverending Story. It is a power which destroys Fantastica one by one by absorbing it.
Novel
In the novel, the Nothing is revealed to be tied to the human world; it is created by humans' lack of imagination and reluctance to read books. Gmork implies that all Fantasticans lost to The Nothing are reborn in the human world as lies.
The Manipulators are the power behind the Nothing and Gmork's masters. Their goal is to destroy Fantastica in order to replace fantasy with lies to manipulate and control the human race.
In the first half of the novel, The Nothing is revealed to be a mysterious and dark parasite, with the sole intention of running the magical universe of Fantastica into extinction by consuming its very existence.
When compared to a hole, the Rockbiter replied that a hole would be something, but there was nothing. Later on, when Atreyu attempts to glance at The Nothing, his eyes hurt, simply because his brain was not able to comprehend what it is he saw. It is eventually revealed that some unknown entity is behind the Nothing, though the identity of this entity is never revealed.
It also gives people the desire to surrender themselves to oblivion by jumping into the nmothing.
The Nothing succeeds in destroying Fantastica, but Bastian creates a new version of the world.
Films
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The NeverEnding Story (1984)
In the first film, The Nothing is depicted as a raging storm, and the Manipulators are not mentioned at all.