After the narcissist was with you for some time, they soon began to point out your faults and mistakes, they began to pick on your flaws and imperfections. They began to treat you as though you were not good enough for them and as though you couldn't do anything right. This is the devaluation phase, this is when they begin to devalue you and degrade you and publicly humiliate and exploit you. They begin to treat you as though you are worthless or beneath their consideration. While they are doing this, they are also lining up another source of supply. They are grooming them, preparing or training them for the purpose or activity of providing them with supply.
They are going to keep you around until the new source is fully prepared and trained. Until they feel sure that the new source is secured and is suitable for the purpose or activity that they have assigned to them. Until then, they will keep you around as a source of stability and security. They will use you as a negative source of supply, someone who they can abuse and manipulate, someone who will make them feel as though they are something significant or powerful. Someone who will make them feel as though they are in control, someone who will make them feel as though they exist.
Narcissists feel very insignificant and powerless, they feel insecure and because the false self that they've created isn't real, they constantly need people to validate and prop up their false self. They need to keep you around for abuse and manipulation, for the purpose of making them feel significant or powerful. It makes them feel as though they're in control or as though they exist. But this is just to compensate for how they really feel underneath the mask of their false self.
Once the new source is fully prepared and trained, the narcissist will want to advance them to be their primary source of supply. Which means that they are going to be ready to discard you. The narcissist will then enjoy whatever is left of the love-bombing phase with the new source. But soon enough their enjoyment is going to come to an end. The cycle always repeats itself. Soon enough the narcissist will begin to point out faults and mistakes, flaws and imperfections. Once again the narcissist will feel as though the new source isn't good enough for them or they couldn't do anything right. Just as if they did with everyone before them, they will begin to doubt their decision, they will begin to feel as though they shouldn't have made them their primary source of supply.
They will re-idealise you and begin to see you as the most suitable and ideal source of supply. This is when they will try to return to you, they will try to love bomb you again. If you take them back, you might have a few days of fake love and affection, before they begin to devalue you again. But if you reject their hoover attempts, this is where their obsession begins, this is where the idea or thought of you continually preoccupies and intrudes on their mind.
They will stalk you, especially on social media. This is where you get the opportunity to show them just how much your life has improved since you have moved on from them. This is where you get to show them who was really the issue or problem in that relationship. You may feel tempted to respond to their hoover attempts. You may feel that it is the only way to take back your power. But it is not, the power is within you. It always was, they tricked you into believing that they had power over you, by targeting your self worth and your self esteem. They had to make you believe that you were beneath them because secretly they always believed that you were greater than them. Their feelings of inadequacy then triggered them into taking actions of trying to bring you down to their level, trying to level the playing field and making things even. But even that wasn't enough for them, because they already felt that you were greater than them. That's what triggered them to devalue you, it was either you or them. There was no way that they were going to reflect on themselves, so they had to project their insecurities onto you. They had to devalue you to validate their false self.
So don't feel any need to respond to their hoover attempts. The power is within you, it always was. You do not need them to make you feel any better, they can only give you the illusion of making you feel good by reflecting back to you who you are or what you're about. You can feel that way already just by going within yourself, you do not need them. They have to trick you into believing that you need them, just so they can use you for their own selfish needs.
As you maintain no contact with the narcissist, they will begin to regret their actions. They will begin to regret discarding you, they will begin to regret leaving you for the new source. They will feel sad and disappointed over what they have done and the undesirable situation that they are now in. But they don't feel sad or disappointed for you, it's still all about them. They are not sorry for you, they just dislike the undesirable situation that they now find themselves in. They feel embarrassed, ashamed, miserable, intensely annoyed and bored with this new source. This is what they are dealing with while you are going no contact with them. They are constantly thinking about you. The thought of you is preoccupying and filling their mind continually and to a troubling extent.