Nginx single application config
You dont want nginx.conf in the project root and its not necessary. Also, you don't want direct changes to nginx.conf, you will instead want specific files for different websites in /etc/nginx/sites-available which you enable with a ln in /etc/nginx/sites-enabled.
As far as the config:
server { root /var/www/mysite/; #or whereever your site files are index index.html; location /{ try_files $uri $uri/ =404; }}You are missing the root portion which tells nginx where the site is located.