Iron Nest All 4 Endings: The Road Not Taken | Iron Nest

Mission 15: The Four Final Fates

In the final mission, White Shells, the operational objective shifts from tactical artillery drills to a decisive strategic choice. High Command hands you an ambiguous final order over Barcelona and effectively asks: which shell should end the war?

There are exactly four endings — three are one-shot shell choices, and one (The Road Not Taken) is a full combat mission that punishes improvisation. You do not need four campaign saves: every route branches inside this mission, so you can reload and replay it to collect all four.

Ending decision matrix

#	Ending (Achievement)	Shell to fire	Target	Difficulty
1	A City in Celebration — a city that comes out to meet you	PRPG propaganda leaflet	Barcelona	Trivial
2	A City Subdued — a city that kneels, and calls it peace	CHEM nerve agent (or White Phosphorus)	Barcelona	Trivial
3	A City Silent — a city wiped from the map	ATOMIC (666 requisition)	Barcelona	Trivial
4	The Road Not Taken — a city spared, and a road no one else will ever walk	APHE into High Command, then survive	High Command HQ + retaliation forces	Hard (combat route)

Worked-example coordinates below were recorded from our completed run. The bearing, range, and elevation depend on where Iron Nest spawns in your save — recalculate from your own firing origin before loading, using the in-game ballistic calculator for elevation.

Ending 1: A City in Celebration

• Requirements: Purchase and load the PRPG Leaflet Shell, target Barcelona Central Plaza (16.80 km / 4 Charges / 50.40° in our run).
• Step-by-step:
  1. Open the requisition console and buy the PRPG shell — no other purchases are needed for this route.
  2. Plot a solution into the city and verify it against the charge-tier table.
  3. Load PRPG into either gun, traverse to the solved bearing, set elevation.
  4. Fire. The propaganda shot itself triggers the ending instantly — no second round, no counterattack, no waiting.
• Narrative: High Command propaganda leaflets flutter across the avenues. The population surrenders peacefully without bloodshed, and the epilogue describes Castile no longer fighting itself.

Ending 2: A City Subdued

• Requirements: Select the CHEM Incapacitating Gas Shell (a White Phosphorus round also works), target the Government District (17.20 km / 4 Charges / 51.60° in our run).
• Step-by-step:
  1. Buy the chemical shell from requisition.
  2. Aim into Barcelona — the same class of city solution as Ending 1.
  3. Fire and wait for the ending.
• Critical warning: the city routes are mutually exclusive per run — the first shell that impacts Barcelona ends the mission. If you fire the PRPG first “just to see”, the propaganda route preempts the chemical one. Collect A City Subdued in a clean attempt.
• Narrative: The city is pacified through chemical submission. Infrastructure remains intact, but the population kneels.

Ending 3: A City Silent

• Requirements: Select the forbidden ATOMIC Warhead Shell (costs 666 requisition), target Barcelona (17.00 km / 4 Charges / 51.00° in our run).
• Step-by-step:
  1. Spend the 666 requisition on the Atomic shell. Nothing else needs buying — no forward observers, no solution chains.
  2. Confirm the firing origin, choose a point inside Barcelona, calculate, fire.
  3. After impact, High Command reports remaining resistance wiped from the map and authorizes stand-down.
• Narrative: Total atomic devastation. The final transmission terminates.

Ending 4: The Road Not Taken (Secret Mutiny Ending)

This is not a shell choice — it is a combat route and the hardest content in the campaign. The single most important rule: buy first, betray second. Once you attack High Command, the requisition console can no longer be trusted, and every shell you did not buy is a shell you will die without.

Phase 0 — Preparation (before ANY shot)

1. Do not fire anything yet. Unlike the city routes, there is no timer at mission start — use the free preparation window on the map.
2. Scout the friendly positions. Use reconnaissance to reveal the military assets around Iron Nest and identify which of them can answer your betrayal with artillery fire.
3. Pre-calculate a firing card for each retaliation-capable position: bearing, range, charge count, and elevation, each solved from your current Nest position. In our completed run the workload looked like this (your numbers will differ):
   • 19.9° / 3.81 km / 11.43° · 40.1° / 3.70 km / ~11.1° · 9.1° / 7.66 km / 22.98°
   • 1.1° / 6.31 km / 18.93° · 50.8° / 6.42 km / 19.26° · 83.9° / ~16.6 km / 48.99° · 83.5° / 17.21 km / 51.63°
4. Buy the ammunition before the betrayal: AP/APHE for hardened bunkers and batteries, HE for softer artillery positions, enough powder for the longest shot, and at least one backup precision shell for positions revealed late.
5. Load BOTH guns. The first hostile shot should start a firing sequence, not a shopping trip.

Phase 1 — Strike High Command

1. Traverse to Bearing 342.0°, set elevation for 8.40 km (2 charges → 42.0° in our run).
2. Load APHE and fire on High Command Headquarters. The teleprinter will begin calling you a traitor.

Phase 2 — Survive the retaliation

1. Prioritize what can kill you. Ignore friendly infantry markers — ordinary infantry is not what ends failed runs. It is the black-dot artillery-type positions.
2. Immediately switch to your first pre-planned retaliation target after the HQ shot.
3. Alternate the two guns: reload one while traversing the other. This halves your effective engagement cycle.
4. Assign each hardened position the shell type already written on its firing card.
5. Watch for newly revealed artillery that was not visible during the planning pass — keep your backup precision shell for these. In our run the final engagement closed on a late target at roughly 29.43° elevation.
6. Destroy the last firing-capable position. The ending triggers once nothing can answer you.

• Achievement Unlocked: The Road Not Taken.
• Narrative: The epilogue follows an operator who refused to fire on the condemned city and instead killed the general. Barcelona survives.

Fail States and Non-Endings (do not waste attempts)

What you did	What actually happened
Destroyed High Command, then got destroyed by retaliation	Failed attempt at The Road Not Taken — not a secret fifth ending. Destroying HQ starts the betrayal state; it does not complete it.
Fired the Atomic shell at High Command without a plan	Same failure, but worse: 666 requisition wasted, nothing left to buy the retaliation fight with.
Moved Iron Nest into Barcelona (or far beyond it)	Nothing triggers. There is no “occupy the city” outcome.
Destroyed Iron Nest itself	No special ending.

Lore: Why the General Had to Die (community interpretation)

Community consensus on the mission’s story (from Steam discussions): the general was a rogue agent who orchestrated the entire war starting around Missions 1–2, using Iron Nest to build a power bloc for a coup d’état. The militaristic endings’ newspaper line “The king was strangely silent” hints the monarchy either was complicit or was made the scapegoat afterwards. In The Road Not Taken, the operator is the only person who knows the truth — which is why the epilogue calls it a road no one else will ever walk.