Apex domains cannot have CNAME records.
Question and response
Question
dig vern.cc. NS
Answer
vern.cc. 4 NS ns2.vern.cc.
vern.cc. 4 NS ns1.vern.cc.
Authority
The response has no authority records.
Additional
ns1.vern.cc. 4 A 5.161.108.85
ns2.vern.cc. 4 A 192.46.210.187
. 0 OPT ; payload 1232, xrcode 0, version 0, flags 0