What you've showed us can't work if $query contains the string "query".
To get into the "then" part, $hash{query} must contain the string "query", which will cause the following @{$hash{$query}} to fail.
If you get into the "else" part, $hash{query} is set to the string "query", which will cause the following @{$hash{$query}} to fail.
In reply to Re^3: Can't use string ("query") as an ARRAY ref error
by ikegami
in thread Can't use string ("query") as an ARRAY ref error
by Anonymous Monk
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