A regular 2/3 archer and 3/4 Immortals in two different places (so, four), fortified and presumably healing their wounds, inflicted from passing by an army.
Two veteran immortals approaching Sardica (my easternmost city) slowly.
One veteran immortal on the olive oil closest to Ambracia. (The city I'm closest to losing.)
One elite 3/5 immortal (he killed Greek cannon fodder) outside my city boarders, presumably fortifying next turn to begin recovering health.
One veteran immortal having driven back my elite heavy cavalry.
14 full-health veteran immortals slowly approaching Ambracia...with three full-health regular immortals, one wounded veteran immortal, one wounded regular immortal, three regular archers, and a fourth wounded regular archer. (Total: 26.)
23 immortals slowly moving towards Sardica, with them evenly split between veteran and regular. (Remember, this is the same force which was attacking Thessalonica.)
The single heavy cavalry to the south.
A few spearmen to the south (a little over half a dozen scattered about. Actually almost a dozen total), with a single wounded Immortals. (Basically, cannon fodder which can't attack literally at all. This is the units they send to be annoying.)
And that's it.
And get this: the Persians are willing to negotiate.
Keep in mind on a bad turn where my armies fail to hold Thessalonica I've tried negotiating with them just out of curiosity as to whether they would and they refused the envoy. Meaning that apparently, my scorched earth tactic? It actually works.
Because at my disposal, I've got...two regular swordsmen, a veteran numidian mercenary, and two heavy cavalry in Ambracia (that's not enough to hold the line against 26 units by the way), with more capable of being created (I can create one or two Heavy Cavalry per turn, by burning my gold stockpile), my badly-wounded heavy cavalry, two heavy cavalry who are partially wounded, my three armies, a badly-wounded elite archer, a spare regular Numidian mercenary, and one Numidian Mercenary defending Sardica.
Since any non-mobile unit attacking the horde is suicidal, that comes out to be three heavy cavalry attacks (one requiring heavy save scumming, two likely requiring fair amounts of save scumming) in the open, six army attacks, and two heavy cavalry attacks from Ambracia.
With me able to make one extra heavy cavalry at Ambracia before the Persians reach there, and one extra heavy cavalry at Sardica before the Persians reach there.
If I'm lucky, I might be able to in the southern front capture Melitene in that timeframe, too. (Capturing Melitene would cut the Persians off. I'd have preferred to do that at Byzantium, but isolating the top half of their cities from their bottom half works just as well.
So I think I'll be going for this.
And then instead of scorched earth for all my cities there, negotiating peace when the Persians are right on the doorstep. Now, admittedly.
I don't think the peace will last.
I'd be churning out military units to the north the entire time were peace arranged.
Maybe I'd make barracks up there if necessary, too.
But I'd be mostly just pumping out military units left and right.
Because I'd be preparing for a second wave.
It wouldn't need to last, though. Just give my troops time to rest, recover, gather their strength, and then show the Persians why it was a bad idea to assume they held the edge just because they could swarm me while I wasn't at full-strength.
I'll have my revenge.
I'll just have it...at a later time.
Maybe even post-victory, since again, at 19% of world area, need 20% to win, losing Thessalonica doesn't set me back to 18%, and gaining Melitene would be literally identical to Thessalonica in size effectively, so it's right there on the edge of expanding, with me having cities preparing to expand.