Gladness(1) buoyed Atreyu's heart as he strode into the forest of columns which cast black shadows in the bright moonlight.

He still doesn't know who he is or why he's come, but he passes through the columns, which are described at length. After going for some time, he hears a sound in the distance, a sad singing voice. It moves toward him even after he stops moving, and soon he can hear the words, as she sings about how she must die someday.

Atreyu asks who she is, and she asks back, and he says he doesn't know, though he knows he knew once. The voice sings that Atreyu must reply in rhyme, because she cannot understand anything that's not in poetic form.(2) It's difficult, but Atreyu manages to ask who she is, and the voice thanks him, acknowledges she can hear him now, and says she's "Uyulala, the voice of silence" and that they are in "the Palace of Deep Mystery."

Through more exchanges, Atreyu establishes that Uyulala exists only as sound, and that she sounds so sad because the CLE is dying, and so Uyulala is dying. Atreyu doesn't remember his quest, but when Uyulala talks about the Empress needing a new name, he asks who can give one to her. Uyulala gives a half-page verse about how he must remember her next words carefully, then a full page of explanation of there being another world, where humans live. Only they can give the CLE a new name with every age of Fantastica, but no humans have visited in so long, they have forgotten Fantastica, so only a child of man can save the CLE.

Then, with prompts between from Atreyu, Uyulala gives another half-page of verse saying only Atreyu can decide what to do with this information, and that now it's time for her to die, and the first verse in the chapter is repeated, and then no more.

Atreyu falls asleep, and when he wakes, he remembers his quest, and Uyulala's words. He knows what to do now.

Bastian thinks how he'd love to help if he could, if Fantastica were real and he could go there and give the CLE a new name. He whispers that if there's any way he can help, Atreyu should tell him, and he'll come.

Atreyu, for his part, sees a patch of Nothing and starts running away from it. He keeps running until he comes to what look like the mountains where he'd first entered the Great Riddle Gate. He keeps running, and finds the stones now look grey, not red anymore, but it feels the same. Eventually, he finds the Great Riddle Gate collapsed, and the sphinxes have disappeared. He can't see the way he took from the gnomes' cave, so he calls out, and Falkor comes out to retrieve him, saying they'd almost given up hope. Atreyu thinks it's only been a day, but Falkor brings him back to the gnomes to explain.

Engywook launches into questions, but Urgl insists they let Atreyu eat and drink first.

Bastian thinks of the two chocolate bars he keeps in his bedside table, in case he gets hungry at night. He would have brought them as rations if he'd known he'd run away like this, but no matter.(3) Falkor finally says that it's been seven days and nights since Atreyu left, which is why he's almost fully healed. Engywook says space and time must be different inside the gates.

Before Atreyu can tell his story, he asks what's been happening out here since his journey. Engywook points out that colours are fading, and the gate collapsed in the same moment as the sphinxes disappeared, with no apparent action on anyone's part,(4) leaving the ruins of the gate looking hundreds of years old and moss-covered.

Finally, Atreyu tells them his whole story, and Engywook wails that his life's work is over if Uyulala is dead. Urgl says she needs to start packing, now that Engywook will be willing to leave and they can escape the Nothing. Falkor and Atreyu offer the gnomes a ride to wherever they're going, but Urgl says no self-respecting gnome would ever fly, and the best thanks they can give is to get the Great Quest underway again. So, they do.

When some hours later [Urgl] and Engywook stepped out into the open, each was carrying an overloaded back-basket, and again they were busily quarreling. Off they waddled on their tiny, crooked legs, and never once looked back. Later on, Engywook became very famous, in fact, he became the most famous gnome in the world, but not because of his scientific investigations. That, however, is another story that shall be told another time. [...] Involuntarily, Bastian looked up at the skylight, trying to imagine how it would be if Falkor came cutting through the darkening sky like a dancing white flame, if he and Atreyu were coming to get him. 'Oh my,' he sighed. 'Wouldn't that be something!' He could help them, and they could help him. He would be saved and so would Fantastica.

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