Here's my experience with Bliss, got one shortly after it was released... Soft, no. Vivid, dynamic, transparent, immersive, holographic, neutral without being sterile, engaging, pitch black background, yes. But I only achieved that fully after controlling AC line noise in my abode. Then I started hearing amazing texture and tactility. I began to hear subtle plucks and vibrations of strings, the texture of rosin on the bow, something dropping on the floor yards away, musicians breathing, that kind of detail. Guitars became visceral, with intoxicating texture I never knew existed. Listening to even old studio recordings brought me closer to the feeling of a live performance. Instruments and vocals sound strikingly REAL. That level of detail seems easily obscured by noise, at each stage along the chain, source being probably the most critical. I've found Bliss to be very revealing of any defects in the chain, part of the trade off and blessing. So for instance, when it sounded a bit lean, I worked with cabling to my cans, found silver coated copper returned the body that I wanted. I discovered that synergy of components is important. As discussed further back in this thread, because of the lack of harshness, it's easy with Bliss to listen at volume levels that probably aren't good for our hearing, so there's that...
Currently my chain is an AMD laptop with Realtek HD sound>Qobuz ASIO>OFCC USB>May KTE>Hapa Ember (copper) XLR>Bliss KTE>silver coated copper XLR to HD660S2, so that's my reference. If you use the ESS Dac in your amp, looking at a good R2R Dac might help reduce harshness. To my ears, ESS chips sound very detailed but tend towards treble brightness, but that could have been an implementation issue in ones I sampled. I haven't heard a TOTL ESS Dac, but once I heard a good R2R Dac, there was no looking back for me, ha. It's whatever sounds best to your ears...
Seems a good tube amp may also give you the qualities you are looking for, with more flexibility in tweaking the sound... I've tried a tube preamp with Bliss, and eventually returned to just Bliss. When fed with clean power, signal and cabling, it checks all my boxes, no harshness at higher volume, no sonic adjustments are needed. I just get lost in music.