It's kind of funny. Some people are saying that the lack of romance as a driving factor in the story was a problem that made it boring or bad. That it didn't work because the author was trying to tell a non-romantic story within the framework of a romantic one.
The way I see it, it's not the lack of romance that's the problem. It's the lack of people's ability to comprehend a story without it. This is what normativity is about. Heteronormativity takes away society's ability to see gay as normal. Allonormativity takes away the ability to see ace and aro as normal. Obviously the people on this site would mostly see gay relationships as normal, but that's not what this story is about.
The author isn't "using the wrong kind of storytelling". The reader is, to put it plainly, expecting the wrong story. This has, from the very beginning, been a story about ace-spec people. The text is quite clear on that. At no point has it been anything else. The idea that there wasn't any payoff is built upon a pre-conceived notion of what the payoff would have looked like.
I was happy with the ending. It could have been better, but it wasn't bad. The only complaint I have is something many others have touched on: Rio was completely unmentioned despite being a pretty significant character. She was at least as important as Matoi's sister, that's for sure.
Regardless, I enjoyed myself. The afterword was fascinating. I had no idea that the meaning of "asexual" in Japan was more equivalent to aro ace in the west. I was a bit surprised the author knew there was a difference, but they seem to have put a lot of work into getting things right, so it makes sense that they'd know. I wonder if the author is ace-spec? I assume so, but I'd have to look into it to be sure.
Oh, also, it's definitely yuri
. I don't know for sure if it should be tagged romance
or not, but I'd say yes.
We need asexual
and aromantic
tags on dynasty. demisexual
too, probably. That said, finding any media with ace-spectrum characters is nigh impossible, so there'd probably only be like...one or two things with those tags.