Dashboard auto-refresh re-run on application database OR source database

I have added a card on dashboard which is a saved question. The sql query of that questions takes 10-15 seconds first time. So after adding it to dashboard it took 10-15 seconds to display data on dashboard. Now if I manually refresh browser tab, the card is loaded in 1 second because now the data has been pulled from source database to metabase application database. I understood this.

Now when I do auto-refresh in dashboard, on timer completion, it loads again in 1 second, so it means it is re-running the query of that card but on application database. Had it been running on source database it would have taken 10-15 seconds like first time.

Please let me know if my understanding is correct.
Because here it is mentioned that it re-runs the queries but not telling on which db (application or source). My observation says it is application db.

Thanks in advance

Edit - this was when caching for saved questions was enabled. When caching was not enabled, on auto-refresh & browser tab refresh, all card queries were actually ran on source db and not on application db

cached results get saved in the application database, and your understanding is correct

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