Coalbit

Coalbits are small creatures made out of coal that appear in Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story and Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story + Bowser Jr.'s Journey. They are fought in the Tunnel, where they assist Choombas in battle.

Battle
Coalbits do not actually attack when fighting Bowser. Rather, they jump into the smokestack of the Choomba they are traveling with to power it up and allow it to attack multiple times in a row if Bowser does not inhale them quickly; they may also flee from battle. If Bowser inhales the Coalbits, Mario and Luigi must fight them inside his body.

To attack, the Coalbits line up in front of one of the Bros. and march towards him with their pincers in the air, forcing the Bro to jump over all of them at once. If there are too many in the battle for the brother to be able to jump, there will be breaks in the Coalbits' formation that the player must time their jumps between. This attack can poison one of the brothers in the remake. Coalbits are usually found in groups of three in tandem with Choomba, but can sometimes be found in groups of five in later parts of the Tunnel. Strangely enough, though coal is flammable, Coalbits take no damage from the Fire Flower special attack or the Flame attack (this was fixed in the remake). They are also one of the very few enemies to be able to resist the dizzy status.

Trivia

 * Coalbits are one of the few enemies to not appear in Bowser Jr.'s Journey.

Kohlameise Formicarbone