One of their reasons: the art style.
Tch. Just because the art isn't that great to their perspective doesn't mean the story isn't great either. You got a story that has great art but the story is SHITTY. People who reads good art but shitty story sucks. But just like what < starflea > said, people have different tastes. Heh!
Yeah. I see a lot of people complaining about the art style as not to their liking. Not just here though, but also in tiktok. I'm more active in tiktok and see a lot of contents, even stuffs I haven't watched nor read pops out there. That's how I first discovered Smyrna and Capri and the other stories from the very same author. And whenever I open the comment box, the comment box would be divided in two sides. One sides is filled with positive comments while the other side is filled with negative comments. I tend to ignore the negative ones but one of the comments/complaints I read is the art style. I'm not quite sure if I ever saw a comment about how the story is nothing but mid though. Well, people are different after all, just like what you mentioned.
can't believe some people are hating the story or calling it mediocre...ik people have different tastes blah blah but that's actually funny