How do I get particles to blend together? (HDRP & VFX Graph)

Hi, I have been trying to make a basic smoke system, and when I enable use a normal map, there are hard edges between the particles, as well as particles snapping in front of one another making it look like it's flickering. I do have soft particles enabled, but that doesn't seem to help. I also tried decreasing the normal scale, and that took care of the hard edges for the most part, but they still snap in front of each other, not to mention I don't think I should have to sacrifice normal scale for this assuming there is a better way.

Here is a video I recorded so you can see how it looks:

Could anyone help me with this? Thanks in advance for any suggestions.