punishing vs tormenting

punishing

adj
  • Debilitating, harsh. 

  • That punishes physically and/or mentally; arduous, gruelling, demanding. 

noun
  • Punishment. 

tormenting

adj
  • Involving or causing torment. 

noun
  • The act by which somebody is tormented. 

How often have the words punishing and tormenting occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )