"What I meant is I assumed they'd be invisible, like everything else on this ship." Invisible chefs, invisible cleaning crew, stands to reason an invisible squadron of sailors keeping this thing afloat.

And then Skulduggery keeps talking and the card game is all but forgotten.

"So there's a creature that looks like a captain but might not be a captain and it eats suffering. Am I understanding that correctly?" the term for Max's tone would be: disbelieving.