All you have done is made the comparison implicit instead of explicit. The full form of your question would be "Why is the Universe here (instead of not here)"

All you have done is made the comparison implicit instead of explicit. The full form of your question would be "Why is the Universe here (instead of not here)" in which "not here" is just a euphemism or a form of "nothing". You cannot escape the axioms that existence exists and that we know it. This is the starting point of any claim to knowledge even claims that deny existence or our awareness of it. That is what makes such questions invalid.