Think it comes down to if it was open bordered back then. Cause he wad a wandering swordsman then.
With regards to the monsters thing, from the way Oda phrased his words in the above sbs, from the english translations at least, I think it's just a case of Oda integrating the Ryuma from monsters into one piece, and replicating his feats from monsters in one piece. So monsters isn't necessarily a prequel to one piece like I initially thought. Oda just copy and pasted the character from one verse into another I reckon. So yh I think @Garp the Fist is right





