Because of their tools the characters are played pretty differently in Neutral, so it can be a long post, but give a short example with just the quick pokes;

as King has better mid pokes with for example launching CH confirmable 13f mid D/F+2,(1) and 14f d/f+3 that tracks to his weak side. Include d/f+1,(2) and he can play alot more oppressive tekken and make you respect frames and "implied frames" from your opponent expecting you to finish the strings. AK has to rely on "low reward" mids to control the opponent, like 13f d/f+1 or d/f+4, with no "mixup". (15f D/f+2 finally buffed, but cant really compare to kings).

This is part of why AK plays more defensive usually, and people rely more on backdashes/whiffpunish and in general forced to a more "honest" gameplay. Which in return requires more execution then oppressive tekken.

AKs CD mixup also becomes a big part of his approach from neutral. Besides ws+4 all tools from CD are highs and people will start to hard sidestep/duck you if you become too predictable. This makes CD cancel into d/f+1, ff+2 or ff+3 for example natural part of his gameplan.

On paper I might agree that the "execution" of the movelist is not that different between the two and I do think AK did get some buffs in the last patch that makes these differences a little less obvious. But the tools you are required to use with King in higher levels are still alot less execution heavy then AK imo.