Others may have mixed up 6 sense contacts and self.
There’s no self, but 6 sense contacts can be directly experienced, is the whole of experience, in fact.
When using the term tathāgata, the Buddha was using it in the ultimate sense of having a self. Since there’s ultimately no self, it cannot be found even when the Buddha was alive. What we call the Buddha is a labeling of certain 5 aggregates which are now long gone.
5 aggregates, 6 sense contacts are the ultimate things. They can be directly perceived and known to exist or not. They are impermanent, suffering, not self, empty of self.
Emptiness cannot be applied to self, as there’s no such thing as a self to apply emptiness to. Same with all the concepts including existence or non-existence. The self is a delusional thing. A mirage. Doesn’t actually exist.
This is where I believe a lot of people mixes these two things up. When the 6 sense contacts, 5 aggregates are also called foam, mirage, due to it’s impermanent nature, and empty of inherent existence.
Let’s look at a mirage to analyze further. The light that reaches the eye to form mirage certainly exist. The misconception of the oasis at that location in the desert exist as ignorance, the oasis doesn’t exist.
Similarly, the 5 aggregates, 6 sense contacts exist, the misconception that these are mine, me, or I am these exist as ignorance, but the I, me, mine doesn’t exist.
The difference between arahant and unenlightened people is that arahants have the 5 aggregates, 6 sense contacts, but no ignorance that they are self or the “I am” conceit.
For everyone always, there’s no I, me, mine.
This analysis avoids the potentially confusing terminology of ontological status, exist etc.