malevolency vs cruelty

malevolency and cruelty both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
malevolency	Yes	No	No	No
cruelty	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, cruelty is a hyponym of malevolency; that is, cruelty is a word with a more specific, narrower meaning than malevolency:

Other hyponyms of malevolency include bitchiness, cattiness, nastiness, spite, spitefulness, cruelness, harshness, beastliness, meanness.

malevolency (noun)	cruelty (noun)
the quality of threatening evil	a cruel act; a deliberate infliction of pain and suffering
	the quality of being cruel and causing tension or annoyance
	feelings of extreme heartlessness