diff --git a/server/index.ts b/server/index.ts
index 9b91c3e..32deafa 100644
--- a/server/index.ts
+++ b/server/index.ts
@@ -1902,7 +1902,7 @@ app.post("/api/ascii-gen", async (c) => {
 				prompt,
 				width: width || 80,
 				height: height || 40,
-				palette: palette || "ansi",
+				palette: palette || "classic",
 				output_format: output_format || "html",
 			}),
 			signal: AbortSignal.timeout(30_000),
@@ -1911,8 +1911,11 @@ app.post("/api/ascii-gen", async (c) => {
 			const err = await res.text();
 			return c.json({ error: `ASCII art service error: ${err}` }, res.status as any);
 		}
-		const data = await res.json();
-		return c.json(data);
+		// Service returns raw HTML — wrap in JSON for the client
+		const htmlContent = await res.text();
+		// Strip HTML tags to get plain text version
+		const textContent = htmlContent.replace(/<[^>]*>/g, "").replace(/&lt;/g, "<").replace(/&gt;/g, ">").replace(/&amp;/g, "&");
+		return c.json({ html: htmlContent, text: textContent });
 	} catch (e: any) {
 		console.error("[ascii-gen] error:", e);
 		return c.json({ error: `ASCII art service unavailable: ${e.message}` }, 502);
@@ -1931,8 +1934,9 @@ app.post("/api/ascii-gen/render", async (c) => {
 			const err = await res.text();
 			return c.json({ error: `ASCII render error: ${err}` }, res.status as any);
 		}
-		const data = await res.json();
-		return c.json(data);
+		const htmlContent = await res.text();
+		const textContent = htmlContent.replace(/<[^>]*>/g, "").replace(/&lt;/g, "<").replace(/&gt;/g, ">").replace(/&amp;/g, "&");
+		return c.json({ html: htmlContent, text: textContent });
 	} catch (e: any) {
 		console.error("[ascii-gen] render error:", e);
 		return c.json({ error: `ASCII art service unavailable: ${e.message}` }, 502);