Fire gets it’s energy from fuel+oxygen. Most life does too. Plants (and other photosynthetic organisms) can also get energy from light but that requires you to sit in the sun doing not much for a long time. There’s also chemosynthesis, where energy is obtained from a chemical reaction, but that’s usually not nearly as powerful as oxidation.

Put another way, a car with NOS is way faster and more powerful than one without. So too is life that uses oxygen more powerful than life that doesn’t.