If John lived a good long life after the fulfillment of all prophecy with the destruction of the Temple, living all the way to the end of the century as evidenced by the inroads of gnosticism into the church, then he would have explained who the antichrist was and all the other Revelation stuff in one of his letters, or to one of his church members, or to a friend.
Therefore, it's necessary for him to have died.
How do you know he didn't. He may have, and we just don't have a record. But it all speculation. There is nothing requiring John to have died immediately after receiving and recording the Revelation.