Alaric J. "Ric" Saltzman ~ "Look, my life is full of martyrs who cave to the bad guy, trying to be heroes, and it never ends well. Somebody inevitably gets hurt or dead, and that somebody could just as easily be you, or Bonnie regardless, no matter what you do. So, if you wanna fight and keep your magic, I will fight with you. And if not, well... I loved you when you weren't a witch, and I'm pretty sure I will still love you regardless".

Alaric J. "Ric" Saltzman is a vampire hunter, former history teacher at Mystic Falls High School, and a former Enhanced Original, not by being one of the first vampires as the Mikaelson Family were but instead being turned through a spell. He originally came to Mystic Falls to find the vampire who killed his wife, but learned that she voluntarily became a vampire and left him. He also learned that his wife had a child when she was a teenager, a daughter named Elena Gilbert, his student. Alaric began a romantic relationship with her adoptive aunt Jenna. Following Jenna's tragic death, he seemed to step into his step-father role to Elena and is a father figure to her brother, Jeremy. He is also Damon's best friend alongside Enzo, Damon even calling Alaric "brother" on occasions.

Through overuse of the Gilbert Ring, Esther manipulated his spirit while he was on The Other Side before he would resurrect, and as a result he developed an alter ego, called The Darkness by Bonnie and Dark Alaric or Evil Alaric to others, that hated vampires and vampire sympathizers, killing members of the Mystic Falls Founder's Council who protected vampires. Alaric became an Enhanced Original Vampire through Esther's magic so he could kill her children with the last, and indestructible, White Oak Stake, to make the vampire species extinct before his death, his life having been linked to Elena's, leading Rebekah to kill her to stop Alaric. Alaric is now resurrected as his Original Vampire self, while his alter-ego appears to have gone away for good upon his resurrection.

As a vampire hunter he designed several different weapons to fight vampires which include vervain tranquilizers and arm vest stakes.

As a ghost, he watched over Damon, Jeremy, and Elena. In the last two episodes of the Fourth Season, his spirit was brought back into the world of the living (albeit confined within the Expression Triangle) where his presence proved crucial at off-setting the threat of the Hunters of the Five in their goal to kill Silas after curing him of his Immortality. His ghost is resurrected in Home, with the exceptions of Damon, Bonnie, and Lexi, from The Other Side before its destruction, being the last to cross over to the land of the living.

After being resurrected, he is now a college professor at Whitmore College teaching Occult Studies.

Alaric is a non-biological relative of Elena Gilbert, Jeremy Gilbert, the Petrova Family and the Gilbert Family, due to being Elena's step-father through his marriage to Isobel.