Thanks for every reply.
I just couldn't figure out why so I just left it broken, hoping OS upgrade would fix it. (Lucky that the service doesn't have many users.) AND I couldn't help upgrading my test phone(iPhone13) to iOS 18.1 beta, voila now the PhotoPicker doesn't cause any trouble.
It did delay a month for me to upgrade more features but, I learned a lesson that I really should be handling new iOS every year before (at least) any RC version drops.