That's what makes it great; the CLICHE is that cats hate the humans while dogs love them; but this inverts that without actually violating the personality of either animal.

Because cats love getting spoiled so them taking the initiative to help out a civilization that spoiled them the most checks out… and pugs ALWAYS look like they low-key hate that they exist.

How is it backwards? Everything I've learned about the early domestication of cats and dogs implies that ancient man went and turned wolves into dogs by force, whereas cats saw the civilization thing our ancestors were trying out and thinking it was a sweet gig chose to become farm/house cats all on their own.

So it wold make sense that a time traveling cat would want to help ancient civilizations that were enthusiast about human-cat relations, whereas a time traveling member of one of the more sculpted dog breeds (who have often been bred for features that make a dog's life more difficult) might think it's a good idea to stop his ancestors domestication in the first place.